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Building spec sheets

Measure on plans

Draw areas, lengths and counts on a plan page, keep them in colored groups, add a height, depth, pitch or multiplier, and read the totals in the drawer.

Updated September 8, 2026 · 5 min read

Once a plan page has a confirmed scale, you can measure on it. Open the plan from the Takeoff tab, pick a tool from the toolbar above the sheet, and draw. Lengths snap to the nearest sixteenth of an inch by default, and the length shows on the line while you place it. Change the snap (down to a 32nd, up to a whole foot) in Settings, the gear in the header. Every shape lands in the Measurements drawer beside the sheet (below it on a phone) with its result, and the drawer totals by group.

Pick a group before you draw

The group picker on the toolbar decides where the next shape goes. "Individual Measurement" drops it into Uncategorized with a name like rect 1 or polyline 2. A group has a name, a kind (area, length or count), a color and a category such as Flooring or Tiles. Create one from the picker or with New Group, and the tools that do not fit its kind grey out: an area group takes rectangles, polygons and deducts; a length group takes lengths; a count group takes counts. The color swatch beside the picker recolors the active group everywhere it appears.

The five tools

  • Rectangle. Drag over the area. It is committed when you let go.
  • Polygon. Click each corner. Double-click, press Enter, or click the first corner to close. Hold Shift to snap to 45 degree bearings; Backspace removes the last corner. An outline that crosses itself is refused, so fix the corner and try again.
  • Length. Click along the run and double-click or press Enter to finish. The running length shows as you draw. Shift snaps to 45 degree bearings, then to the snap increment.
  • Deduct. Select an area first, then drag a rectangle or click a polygon inside it. The deduct is stored on that area, so a window comes out of the siding it sits in.
  • Count. Click to place a marker. Markers in one group on one page are one count, so ten taps on outlets make one row that reads 10.

Move (V) selects and edits. Drag a shape to move it, drag a corner to reshape it, drag the small dot on an edge to add a corner, press Delete to remove the selection, and hold Option or Alt while you drag to duplicate. Space and drag pans in every tool; the wheel zooms about the cursor. Escape drops back to Move and clears the selection. In the Count tool, Backspace removes the last marker you placed.

Results, dimensions and totals

The drawer shows Name, Result, a cube, and Total. Result is what you drew: square feet for an area, feet and inches for a length, a count for markers. The cube opens Add Dimension: Height or Width turns a length into wall area; Depth turns an area into cubic yards of concrete; Pitch (rise over 12) scales a roof plan by its slope; Multiplier repeats the subtotal for both faces of a wall or two identical rooms. Total is the subtotal times the multiplier.

A page whose scale is not confirmed shows "unscaled" instead of a number, everywhere. Confirm the scale from the banner or Settings and every result on the page fills in at once; recalibrating a page re-derives every result on it.

The drawer

Rows sit under their category, each header with an eye that hides the whole category on the sheet and leaves it out of every total; the eye at the top hides everything. Click a name to rename it. The three-dot menu on a row offers Move To, Duplicate, Convert to Perimeter (a linked length along an area's boundary, the area stays), Hide Layer and Delete. Tick several rows and the bar at the bottom moves, hides or deletes them together. A group's own menu, on its line in the drawer, renames or deletes the group; deleting a group leaves its measurements in place as Uncategorized. Switch the drawer between this page and all pages of the plan. A group total reads "unscaled" while any of its rows sits on a page whose scale is not confirmed, and "mixed units" when its rows do not share a unit.

Undo, saving and rotation

Cmd+Z undoes and Shift+Cmd+Z redoes every drawing, edit, rename, move and delete, including across saves. Changes save on their own a moment after you stop; a save that fails is retried and the drawer says so. A page that carries measurements cannot be rotated, because shapes are stored in the page's own pixels; delete them first if a sheet came in sideways. Rotate lives next to zoom in the header.

On a phone

The drawing tools need a tablet or desktop. On a phone you can pan, zoom, tap a shape to see its result, rename it and set its dimensions from the drawer, and tap to place count markers when a count group is active.

Keyboard

Cmd is Ctrl on Windows.

  • R rectangle, P polygon, L length, D deduct, C count, V move.
  • Cmd+Z undo, Shift+Cmd+Z redo, Delete removes the selection.
  • Cmd+D toggles the drawer, Shift+T the toolbar, Cmd+P the pages rail, Cmd+F search.
  • Plus and minus zoom, 0 fits the page, bracket keys step pages, Escape drops the tool.