Autodesk Introduces Rental Plans for Design Suites

Autodesk has launched rental plans for a few of their design suites; Autodesk AutoCAD Inventor LT Suite and Autodesk AutoCAD Revit LT Suite.  Both are monthly plans and both will cost $95 (U.S.D.) per license.  For an extra $20 (U.S.D.) per month you can add Advanced Support.  Payment can be made through the website where you order the suites via credit card or PayPal.  You can set up your rental agreement to automatically renew itself.


Subscribers to the Inventor LT Suite get AutoCAD LT and Inventor LT.  The Revit LT Suite subscribers receives Revit LT and AutoCAD LT.  If you need to rent just AutoCAD LT, you can, but you get two products for the price.  Just don’t use Revit LT or Inventor LT.

The price for fully purchasing the Inventor LT suite is $1195 (U.S.D.).  An upgrade price is $835.  The price for the Revit LT Suite is the same.

The math is very easy here.  If you need either of these suites for more than 12 months at a time you are better off purchasing the suite in full.  But there are many reasons to rent.  If you have a short term project (lasting only a few months) then why pay for a tool you won’t need once the project is over?  Builders rent tools all of the time to reduce cost, why not designers?  If you hire a temporary employee (or an intern?) and don’t need a full license, then a monthly license can suit your needs in a very cheap and affordable manner.  If you are a freelancer and only need Revit for a short time, rent it.  If you are just starting out and don’t have the capital to buy the software, rent it.

This is a pricing plan that many software developers are starting to use.  It's also one that I tend to like.  This is the start of the future of billing for Autodesk.  At least if you rent you will always have the latest version of the software.