Best Newforma Alternative

See what makes zipBoard Construction Design Reviews and PDF Mark-up Tool the No. 1 Alternative to Bluebeam.

Best Newforma Alternative

zipBoard enables AEC teams to manage project information and collaborate easily with all stakeholders in a secure, central hub. No need to buy licenses for every user. Seamlessly integrate the cloud-based platform with your existing workflow. Make decisions quickly and finish projects faster.

Collaborating on design and construction projects involves several back-and-forths between AEC teams and the different types of information – drawings, documents, RFIs, emails, feedback, and more.

Without a central hub to keep these pieces of information in one place and streamline your workflows, you have to deal with information silos and juggling multiple tools.

This can lead to loss of information, errors, project delay, and even put your firm at risk, among others. Hence, the need for project information management software to easily find information and make decisions quickly.

Meet the Best Bluebeam Alternative - zipBoard

Both zipBoard and Newforma are project information management software that enables AEC teams to manage information throughout a project lifecycle – from design through to construction.

They have common features like document management, collaboration, task management, workflow automation, and reporting tools – that enable architecture firms like yours to streamline information management.

If both software have tools required for project information management for architects, why are you considering a Newforma alternative? And why is zipBoard the best alternative?

zipBoard stands as the best Newforma alternative, considering it is a document management and collaboration software that also couples as a project information management software.

Beyond this, there are key areas where zipBoard differs from Newforma in some of the features they both share.

This guide compares Newforma Project Center and Newforma Konekt with zipBoard.

Economical and Collaborative. No Need to Purchase Licenses for All Users

zipBoard gives you one product to handle all your project information management needs – only billing at the team, agency, or enterprise levels. There’s no per-user fee. Hence, it’s cost effective and all stakeholders do not need licenses to review and fully collaborate on designs and construction documents.

On the other hand, Newforma has different products with unique features to ensure effective project information management and as opposed to zipBoard, each user needs a license to collaborate. Newforma bills per user and seat bundles. Additionally, installation comes at an additional cost for Newforma Project Center. Not to mention the additional costs that come with maintaining the server. However, this is not the case for zipBoard.

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Easy to Deploy and Use - even for Non-Technical Users

zipBoard is very easy to deploy and use, considering it is cloud-based and does not need installations and its features are intuitive. This minimizes and sometimes eliminates training time for your team and allows everyone to get started quickly.

On the contrary, even though Newforma Konekt is a cloud-based solution, Newforma Project Center is an on-premise product that requires installation. Therefore, making its deployment cumbersome as it necessitates IT setups and server configurations – which come at a cost. Newforma’s learning curve is also quite steep, especially for non-technical stakeholders. Hence, requiring training sessions to get used to.

Standard Integrations with Popular Tools and Custom Integrations via APIs

While Newforma has connectors to specific tools, it limits the tools you can integrate with (in Project Centre) – when it comes to your existing tools that do not have Newforma connectors. However, with zipBoard, you get access to APIs that enable you to integrate seamlessly with your current tools to streamline your workflows.

Real-Time Collaboration

Newforma does give you the tools to facilitate real-time collaboration, however, it happens at a slower pace. It takes time for responses on RFIs and Submittals to show up in Procore and other connected tools, thereby delaying the process.

On the contrary, changes and responses on documents and drawings in zipBoard sync quickly with your integrated software and ensure real-time collaboration.

Plus, with zipBoard, architects, engineers, contractors, and owners all have access to relevant tools to manage or collaborate on project information during various stages of the project. This is contrary to Newforma Project Center and Konekt, where the products are more geared towards architects and engineers receiving logs from contractors and not the other way around.

Enhance document and task management

zipBoard’s Kanban workflow visualization, available at both project and task levels makes it easier for you to grasp project progress at a glance. However, Newforma only offers table views, which can be very difficult to visualize and speed up decision-making.

Unlimited Projects and Collaborators

Because Newforma bills per user, it can be difficult to bring all stakeholders on board to collaborate and access project information if you’re on a budget. However, zipBoard allows you to invite unlimited collaborators and create unlimited projects based on your plan. We do not bill per seat.

Multiple Sign-Up Option

zipBoard gives your AEC team multiple sign-up and sign-in options, including signing up with Google or Microsoft accounts, and any other email you prefer. Whereas Newforma only allows sign-in with Microsoft work or school accounts.

Additionally, with zipBoard some stakeholders like clients and owners are not mandated to sign in to view and give feedback on documents. Sign-in is optional. This helps reduce friction and speeds up the review process.

Why choose zipBoard over Newforma?

NB: Comparison is based on Newforma Project Center and Newforma Konekt vs. zipBoard

Compare by Features

Features

zipBoard

Newforma Project Center

Newforma Konekt

Compare by Price

Pricing Details

zipBoard

Newforma

Affordable pricing - only scales with your growth

zipBoard

Newforma

Cost per seat/user

zipBoard

Newforma

Billed

zipBoard

Monthly or Yearly

Newforma

Not available

Unlimited Stakeholders and Collaborators

zipBoard

Newforma

Newforma’s pricing is not readily available online but you can explore zipBard’s Pricing details here.

What Are Our Customers Saying?

By integrating zipBoard into our submittal review process we were able to significantly speed up our pre-construction review phase and hit our construction field goals on time.

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