AI Takeoff: type what you want taken off and it lands on your plan
AI Takeoff runs from the chat inside a BidScreen Cloud takeoff. Type what you want taken off and the counts, lengths and areas land on your sheet, in your own construction classes. Here is how to run one.
Mark Schwab·
The slow part of a takeoff is the repetition. Every hydrant clicked one at a time. Every run of curb traced. Every paving area closed corner by corner, then checked against the legend. Miss one and it comes out of your number.
AI Takeoff does that pass for you in BidScreen Cloud. You type what you want taken off, the way you would tell another estimator, and the counts, lengths and areas land on your sheet, measured into your own construction classes.
How to run an AI takeoff
- Open the AI chat. In a takeoff, click the round sparkle button in the bottom right corner. The chat opens beside your plans, so you never leave the sheet.
- Say what you want taken off. Name the item, and the sheets if you only want some of them. "Count all the fire hydrants." "Measure the curb and gutter on this sheet." "Take off the asphalt paving area."
- Watch it land on your plans. The AI marks each sheet and reports back in the chat as it goes. You can keep working, or close the chat and come back. The run keeps going.
Counts, lengths and areas
It handles the three kinds of quantity a takeoff is made of. Ask for any of them in the same chat.
- Counts. "Count all the fire hydrants." Each one gets its own mark on the sheet, and the class shows the total.
- Lengths. "Measure the curb and gutter on this sheet." The run is traced on the plan and the linear feet go into the class.
- Areas. "Take off the asphalt paving area." The area is outlined on the plan and the square footage goes into the class.
What it looked like on a real sheet
The video shows a count. We opened the utility plan from a retail store set and asked for the sanitary sewer cleanouts. It put four marks on the sheet, one on each cleanout callout, under a Sanitary Sewer Cleanout class.
Open the worksheet and the count is there with the rest of the bid: 4 cleanouts on the same list as the storm pipe in linear feet and the building pad and detention pond in square feet. A length or an area from AI Takeoff lands in that same list.
It goes into your takeoff, not a separate report
- Drawn on the sheet. Counts, lengths, square footage and measurements show up as marks on your plan, so you can see exactly what it counted and what it skipped.
- In your classes. Quantities go into your own construction classes and assemblies, and follow the same worksheet as anything you draw yourself.
- Easy to back out. Every mark the AI makes is tagged and can be undone in one step.
What it does not do yet
AI Takeoff works on vector PDFs and CAD files. Scanned or image-only sheets aren't supported yet.
And AI can be wrong. Check the quantities before you bid. That is the reason the marks sit on the plan instead of in a summary: a missed cleanout is something you can see.
What it costs
AI Takeoff is an add-on at $229 per seat per month. It bills monthly on its own, separate from your yearly plan, and you can cancel any month. It includes everything in Intelligence. There are no credits and no overage bills: a very heavy week runs slower, it never stops. Full details are on the pricing page.
An admin adds it under Organization, Subscription, AI add-ons, then picks the seat it belongs to on the Members tab. The first time that person opens a takeoff, a short walkthrough shows the three steps above. It stays under More tools in the takeoff toolbar after that.
Already have a seat? Log in to app.vertigraph.com, open a sheet and ask it to count or measure something you would rather not.
Try BidScreen XL
Takeoff inside Excel, free for 14 days.
BidScreen XL measures areas, lengths and counts from PDF or CAD plans and writes every quantity into your estimate as a live Excel formula. Windows installer, no card required.