Altium CircuitMaker Reviews & Product Details

The user interface is intuitive, and anyone can start hands-on with a minimal learning curve. The tools are great for even some industrial projects. It's a perfect step to start the journey to Professional PCB design, as it is built on the foundation of Altium Designer. It inherits the robust features of Schematic capture, PCB Layout, 3D visualisation. One of the greatest strengths is its active and supportive community forum, which has helped me enhance my learning and troubleshooting experience. For its no-cost entry point, we have quite frequently opted for CircuitMaker to train interns and students just getting started, and the projects that are created can be easily migrated and integrated with Altium Professional. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

CircuitMaker’s reliance on cloud storage and mandatory project sharing limits its appeal for users needing privacy or offline access. The lack of advanced features like hierarchical schematics and limited third-party integration can hinder complex designs. Improved onboarding for beginners and more flexible project management options would significantly enhance its usability. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The 3D viewer is awesome and makes it super easy to visualize how and what your product is going to physically look like. The Part assembly assistant is great too! It helps guide me through assembling your PCB by picking the parts and showing me where they go on my board. The Whole User Interface is nice to use. Easy to understand, controls and components aren't confusing. I have also found the rule checker to be super good! I find it easy to check by design rules and or normal rules, and it helps me identify anything out of the ordinary. I'm a student in engineering and have used KiCad and other various programs, but liked this one the best for the above, plus the libraries for parts, though I wish some components were updated more and had a footprint, and for how easy it is to learn the software. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I like cloud saving, but hate it at the same time. What I mean by this is that there is no good, easy way to save my projects locally on the software without downloading them from the cloud. I wish there were a save button with the option for the cloud or the option for local only. This is my only gripe so far, getting to know the software is pretty easy, but does take a minute to get used to the software,e just like any other software. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

This is a cut-down version of Altium's higher end products. As such, it has several powerful tools for PCB layout. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The component library is probably its worst and most difficult feature. You can't place a generic component such as a plain resistor, then assign it a package, like I have done in just about any other EDA program I have used. Instead, you have to specify the part number ahead of time - makes sense for an integrated circuit, but not if you want a generic 1K resistor. Then the footprint library is all over the map; some are accurate and some are absolute garbage. Editing the footprints is also harder than in other EDA packages.

The second worst feature is the customer support. I can understand that a free program would have a community-based support forum. But the problem is that there's no moderation and Altium has completely neglected the forum. Predictably, it's been taken over by spammers who drown out any real conversation. The second most common thing you'll find on the forum is a bunch of user complaints that they have been requesting features for years and never received any response.

Unlike mechanical CAD packages, which have usually been following some attempt at a standard user interface, there's not much about the UI that this one has in common with other EDA packages, and so very little will carry over from other EDA software if you've learned elsewhere. But this seems to be true regardless of what EDA solution you pick - they all have wildly different UI.

This product is intended to get entry level users who Altium hopes will move on to their higher end products. Unfortunately, Altium has neglected this product enough that instead it's likely to drive entry level users who try this product on to use KiCAD. While KiCAD also uses a community design library and support forum, these are at least moderated properly. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

So, I have a startup and initially altium gave me a good discount to use the software. Apart from it Main pros that i see is ease of use, very powerful layout designing tools and each file like step, gerber, schematic, production file, assembly file can be generated from one place. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Two things that i want to point out are

1. Very difficult for beginners but it is understood for software tool of this level.

2. It takes time to resolve any bug or issue of software. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I am a total noobie to ECAD but work with some professionals who use Altium Designer. The overlaps between Designer and CircuitMaker are quite helpful because they can help me when I have issues, and occasionally I can help them. It also makes the transition between the two different software packages easier. For example, if I want to start using ECAD professionally, Designer won't be a completely new and unfamiliar tool. I also really like the integration to 365, as I often use 365 for importing and reviewing designs produced in Designer or other ECAD tools. Having all that data, as well as my work in CircuitMaker, in a single location is really useful. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The documentation is really lacking. Seaching anything with CircuitMaker in google often yields answers related to Designer. In some cases the answer is sufficient, but I think the limitations/restrictions of CircuitMaker are not well documented enough to know if you are just doing something wrong, or if the feature is unavailable. The application is also painfully slow to load on initial start up. I use a lot of engineering software packages (SolidWorks, ANSYS, COMSOL, etc.) and all of them are much faster and more responsive than CircuitMaker. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I really enjoy the wide range of features Altium offers for PCB design. The schematic view is intuitive, and sheet symbols make project organization much easier. I also appreciate how simple it is to access component properties and modify them to fit your needs, not only manufacturer parts but internal libraries too. The routing tools are excellent, every aspect of them works perfectly. It just took me only 2 weeks to learn almost everything in the software to start my own projects. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The unit conversion system is frustrating and easily the least practical part of the software. The multiple tabs don’t interact smoothly, often causing me to accidentally close one or spend too much time switching between them. Another issue is the polygon pour colors, they’re overly intense and strain my eyes, yet I still haven’t found an option to change them Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Allium CircuitMaker is the most intuitive and straightforward circuit design solution that I have tried so far. For the most part, everything just works and is easy to get set up. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Creating new/custom components can feel a little buggy, and if you import a component that was made with a different grid spacing, circuit design can end up a little cumbersome. The only other area of friction is having everything saved through the cloud which can be an issue if I’m working away from my desk and internet connection. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I have been using this for my CIrcuit club, and it had helped me discover my love for hardware and embedded systems - how to design, how does circuits work and how we can effectively use it. I love many features of it, such as joint monitoring,or have the server version updated. Not to mention the version histories we can truncate and edit on demand :) Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Took me a bit to make use of the tools, but in all honesty, that is a little laid out study that one would have to do when digging in. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

We have been using Circuitmaker along side Altium 365, This has helped me in created layouts using the library for schematics, Our recent project requiring curcuit boards alongside electical engineers has been going great with the use of circuitmaker.

Circuitmaker has both dark and light mode which is very much helpful in preferences. We have integrated this with all our other mcad tools like fusion 360, altium and codedesigner. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

There is not much to dislike here, the only drawback it the footprint takes a lot of time to load. Also there are no packages for a few circuits in schematic like 74hc245 Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

It like the User interface which gives feel of professional software. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Less features. I did not like the part of not able to import footprints from external sources. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.