Insights
What outsourced CAD actually costs
If you have never outsourced CAD work, the first quote can be hard to read. One studio bills by the hour, another sends a flat number, and the gap between them looks enormous. Here is how the pricing actually works, so you end up paying for the part you need rather than the uncertainty around it.
Why hourly billing usually works against you
An hourly rate quietly moves the risk onto you. If the model takes longer than expected, your bill grows, and you cannot predict the total until the work is finished. A fixed quote flips that around. The studio takes on the risk of estimating the job, and you know the full price before anything starts. The only honest way to quote a fixed price is to understand the work up front, which is why a good studio asks a lot of questions before it sends you a number.
What actually drives the price
A CAD quote comes down to a handful of things:
- How complex the geometry is. A single bracket is not a full assembly with twenty interacting parts.
- How good your reference is. Clean drawings cost less to work from than a blurry photo and a verbal description.
- What you need at the end. A STEP file is one thing. A STEP file plus manufacturing drawings, tolerances and a render set is several.
- How tight the tolerances are. Parts that have to fit or move need more care than parts that only have to look right.
Roughly what to expect
As a rough guide, a single part modelled from a clear reference starts around €440. A complete product with an assembly and manufacturing drawings sits in the €1300 range. A full path from design through CAM to a machined prototype starts around €2000. These are starting points, not fixed numbers. The packages page breaks down what each one includes.
How to get a sharper quote
The most expensive sentence in a brief is the one that is missing. Nine times out of ten, a quote that feels high is really pricing the unknowns, and you can lower it just by removing them. Send dimensions, reference photos and a clear line on what the part has to survive in use. Tell us what done looks like to you. The more certainty you give, the less we have to price defensively, and the sharper the number comes back.