Manufacturing quoting software: the best tools for job shops and fabricators, with prices

Our pick for most job shops and fabricators in 2026 is Morsa, because most quote time goes to gathering, not arithmetic: it reads the RFQ and the drawing, pulls past jobs, routings, machine rates and material prices, gets the plating price and drafts the quote for the estimator to approve. Paperless Parts is the strongest pick for CNC and sheet metal shops that price new parts from 3D models, laser shops can start at $75 a month with Tempus Tools, and shops that mostly quote repeat parts can use the quoting module in JobBOSS², ProShop or Global Shop. Many tools here publish no price; we list every price that is published.

Morsa publishes this guide. Morsa is also one of the tools compared, so we read every other vendor’s facts and prices on its own site or a named third-party page on 25 October 2026 and say where no price is published.

Quick answer

• Our pick for most job shops and fabricators: Morsa, for shops whose quotes wait on past jobs, material prices and outside-process quotes. A pilot comes first, then a share of the value created.

• CNC and sheet metal shops quoting new parts from 3D models: Paperless Parts. Quote only, and not priced per seat.

• Shops quoting mostly repeat or similar parts: the quoting module in the ERP you already run, such as JobBOSS², ProShop or Global Shop.

• Sheet and plate fabricators quoting welded assemblies: SecturaFAB.

• Laser cutting job shops: Tempus Tools, $75 to $375 a month per quoting user billed yearly.

• Platers, anodizers and powder coaters: Steelhead.

• Instant quotes on your own website: DigiFabster, from $415 a month billed yearly plus payment fees.

• Configurable standard products rather than customer drawings: a CPQ such as Cincom CPQ.

What manufacturing quoting software does, and where the time goes

Manufacturing quoting software turns a customer’s RFQ, usually an email with a drawing, into a priced quote. For a job shop or fabricator that means reading the drawing, finding the last similar job, pricing the material, building the routing and cycle times, getting prices for outside processes such as plating or heat treat, adding freight and margin, and writing the quote in the customer’s terms.

Quoting software for machine shops leans on the routing and machine time; fabrication quoting leans on nesting, cut time, bends and welds. Either way, the arithmetic is the quick part. Paperless Parts’ homepage puts a single component quoted by hand at up to two hours and a complex assembly at up to four days [1]. SecturaFAB says it takes complex assembly quotes from a full day or more down to about half an hour [2]. A bidding department on r/manufacturing describes about 2,000 bids a year handled by two estimators who are swamped all the time [3]. As an illustration only, built from Paperless Parts’ up-to-two-hours ceiling and that one poster’s count, 2,000 bids could take up to 4,000 hours, about two people’s full working year.

What that time costs: the median US cost estimator earned $78,740 in May 2025, or $37.86 an hour [4]. Wages are 70.0% of private employers’ compensation costs [5], so a loaded estimator hour is about $54 ($37.86 divided by 0.70), and two hours of quoting is about $108 of estimator time per RFQ, won or lost (our estimate).

This guide covers quoting parts made to a customer’s drawing. Distributors quoting from a catalog have a different problem, matching lines to SKUs; see AI quoting software for distributors. If you are the buyer sending RFQs out, start with RFQ vs RFP.

Which kind of quoting software do you need?

Quoting tools speed up different steps. Match the kind to where your time goes.

Manufacturing quoting software prices compared

Prices read on 25 October 2026. Quote only means the vendor publishes no price; you get a number from sales.

The best manufacturing quoting software in 2026, ranked

Ranked by how many job shop and fabricator situations each one fits.

1. Morsa

Morsa is an AI agent that does daily operations work for manufacturers and distributors inside the ERP, email and phone a team already uses; the company calls it an AI COO for operations. For quoting, it does the legwork around the estimate. Forward or paste an RFQ email with its drawing, and Morsa reads the drawing and pulls the closest past jobs with their routings, your machine rates and today’s material prices. It sends the outside-process RFQs, such as plating, to your suppliers and reads their replies. Then it works out the landed cost and drafts the quote in your own format. The estimator reviews it, changes what needs judgment and sends it.

Best for: job shops and fabricators whose quotes wait on people: finding the last job, getting material and plating prices, and typing it all up.

Why it ranks first: the arithmetic takes minutes; the waiting and gathering take days, and that is the part Morsa takes on. Where the RFQ readers below (Mavlon, Customiser, Kwantflow) describe reading the package and pricing it with your rates, Morsa also sends the outside-process RFQs and reads the replies, computes the landed cost, writes into your ERP, and keeps supplier dates and cert packets moving once the quote becomes an order. It connects to any system with an API, a database, an export or an email trail, such as JobBOSS², ProShop, Global Shop or Epicor, and to each estimator’s own Outlook or Gmail, Teams and phone. Estimators stay in their own inbox and ERP, so there is no new screen to learn. It runs in the cloud, a private cloud or fully on premises, including the AI models.

Watch for: there is no self-serve trial or public price list; it starts with a pilot on one live problem. Morsa drafts and the estimator decides; no quote goes out without approval.

Price: a pilot on one live problem comes first. It is free when no implementation work is needed; otherwise there is a minimal implementation cost, refunded if the pilot shows no value. After that, the fee is a share of the value created, agreed after the pilot. There are no per-seat licences. See how pricing works.

2. Paperless Parts

Paperless Parts is a quoting and collaboration platform for custom part manufacturers, and says more than 800 manufacturers use it [6]. Its patented geometry engine analyzes uploaded part files for setup count, features, manufacturability warnings and volume removal, then prices them with the costing logic you configure; it also nests sheet metal, covers Swiss and additive work, and keeps every RFQ in one searchable place [1][18]. It is ITAR registered, hosted on AWS GovCloud and built for shops pursuing CMMC Level 2, and it integrates with Epicor, JobBOSS², E2, ProShop, Global Shop, Infor VISUAL and SyteLine, MIE Trak Pro and Fulcrum, among others [1][6]. Its homepage contrasts up to two hours to quote a single component by hand with 15 minutes in Paperless Parts [1].

Best for: CNC and sheet metal shops that quote many new parts from 3D models and want consistent, geometry-driven costing, especially defense suppliers that need CMMC.

Watch for: setup effort. Paperless Parts plans onboarding over 8 to 12 weeks and asks each user for 2 to 4 hours a week of sessions plus homework [19]. Users on r/Machinists report that its AI output still needs checking: hardware called out only on the print gets missed, material and finish are entered by hand, and routing times get adjusted. One user there, who calls it a real benefit to their shop, finds it further along for sheet metal than for milling and turning [20].

Price: Paperless Parts pricing is quote only. It does not price by seats; the price depends on shop size, modules, integrations, onboarding and contract length, and the company says price figures on third-party sites are not accurate [6]. Software Finder estimates a start of about $1,500 a month [7].

3. Your ERP’s quoting module: JobBOSS², ProShop, Global Shop and others

If you run a job shop ERP, it has a quoting module, and for repeat work it may be all you need. JobBOSS² builds estimates from preset rates for burden, labor, quantity breaks, setup, run time, outside services and commission, and turns an estimate into a quote with one click [21]. ProShop builds quotes from templates loaded with your actual labor, material and vendor costs, flags estimates below your target margin and converts a won quote into a work order [22]. Global Shop quotes repeat orders from data already in the system and compares estimated with actual time for each operation [23]. MIE Trak Pro carries the quote’s material, routing and outside services into the job [24], and DELMIAWorks converts an approved quote into a bill of materials and a sales order [25].

Best for: shops that quote mostly repeat or similar parts and want the quote to become the job with nothing retyped.

Watch for: the module prices what someone enters. A person still reads the RFQ, finds the history, gets the material and plating prices and keys the estimate.

Price: part of the ERP licence. What each ERP costs, and which fits which shop, is in our job shop ERP guide.

4. SecturaFAB

SecturaFAB is estimating and quoting software for metal fabrication. It imports DXF, DWG, STEP, IGES and SolidWorks files and vector or raster PDFs, cleans them up, nests parts with true-shape nesting, recognizes bend lines and fillet welds, and applies calculators set to your machines, operations and labor rates [26]. It says its customers have quoted more than $7 billion through it and created over 400,000 quotes [26].

Best for: sheet metal and structural fabricators quoting multi-part welded assemblies.

Price: not published on its site.

5. Tempus Tools

Tempus Tools builds quoting for laser cutting job shops: 2D and 3D files in, automatic nesting, folding and coating as secondary processes, drawing cleanup, production documents and, from the Regular plan, a web store where customers get instant quotes and order online [8].

Best for: laser cutting job shops.

Price: per active quoting user: Starter $100 a month (up to 20 jobs a month), Regular $300 and Advanced $500, or $75, $225 and $375 a month billed yearly. Extra quoting users are 50% off, and payments through it carry a 0.5% fee on invoices or 2.0% on web store orders [8].

6. Steelhead

Steelhead is ERP for metal finishers and fabricators, covering plating and anodizing, powder coating, liquid painting, thermal spray and heat treatment, with quoting and order entry, specifications and certifications, and a customer portal [27]. Quotes draw on real-time and historical pricing from previous jobs [9].

Best for: finishing shops, the platers and coaters a job shop sends work to, and fabricators that finish in house.

Price: quote only. SoftwareConnect reports a custom annual subscription built from a core platform plus optional add-ons [9].

7. Mavlon, Customiser and Kwantflow

A newer group of AI tools reads the RFQ package itself and drafts a priced quote from your own rates. Mavlon turns bid packages, meaning the specification, drawings including scans, the bid form and the email thread, into a priced draft within minutes, ties every line to the page that asks for it and prices both readings where the documents disagree [10][28]. Customiser reads 2D drawings and specification documents, builds the bill of materials and prices it with your rates; its Enterprise plan adds DXF and STEP files [29][11]. Kwantflow is free, open-source desktop software that drafts fabrication estimates with AI running on your own computer [12].

Best for: shops whose RFQs arrive as document packages rather than clean CAD.

Price: Mavlon publishes no number and sizes its plan to your yearly bid volume, with no seat pricing [10]. Customiser charges $0.10 per credit, pay as you go, with Enterprise by quote [11]. Kwantflow is free under the GPL-3.0 licence [12].

8. DigiFabster

DigiFabster puts an instant quoting and checkout portal on your website for CNC machining, sheet metal and 3D printing, so buyers upload a file and get a price; it adds an AI quote agent, and ITAR hosting is a paid add-on [13].

Best for: shops that want buyers to price standard processes themselves, online.

Price: as displayed for North America, Bare Essential from $415 a month and Growth from $840 a month, billed yearly, plus payment processing fees of 4.99%, or 0.99% to 1.99% on Growth, plus banking fees; Enterprise by quote [13].

9. Toolpath

Toolpath couples AI quoting with CAM for CNC milling: cycle time, material and cost estimates generated from the part, design-for-manufacturing review, tool recommendations and toolpaths generated inside Autodesk Fusion [14].

Best for: CNC milling shops that want quoting and programming tied together.

Price: free to start, with a free trial; plan prices are not shown on its site [14].

10. SOLIDWORKS Costing

SOLIDWORKS Costing estimates the manufacturing cost of machined and sheet metal parts inside SOLIDWORKS as the model changes, using templates you calibrate to your shop’s rates. It comes with SOLIDWORKS Professional and Premium rather than as a separate product [15].

Best for: shops that model parts in SOLIDWORKS or receive native SOLIDWORKS files.

Watch for: it costs the part. The RFQ, the outside-process prices and the quote document are handled elsewhere.

Price: included in the package. A reseller lists Dassault’s 2026 US subscription for SOLIDWORKS Design Professional at $3,456 a year per seat and Premium at $4,716 [16]; confirm with your reseller that the package you buy includes Costing.

11. Costimator and aPriori

Costimator from MTI Systems, sold to manufacturers since 1982, ships with more than 330 cost models (cycle-time calculators) for machining, sheet metal, welding and assembly, and works with or without a 3D model [30]. aPriori sells model-based quoting that estimates cost directly from 3D models across machining, casting, sheet metal, molding and more, alongside should-cost tools for procurement teams [31].

Best for: estimating departments that want a maintained library of cost models, and larger manufacturers that also run should-cost analysis.

Price: neither publishes a price.

12. Cincom CPQ and other CPQ

CPQ (configure, price, quote) software for manufacturers prices configurable products from rules: options, discounts, approvals and customer price lists, synced with the ERP. Cincom’s pricing module adjusts the price as features are selected and routes concessions for approval, and Cincom prices its CPQ by your configuration needs and user roles [17].

Best for: manufacturers of configurable standard products, such as equipment built from a catalog of options, rather than job shops quoting a customer’s drawing.

Price: quote only. Generic quote-document tools such as PandaDoc format, send and e-sign a quote, but the cost build-up still happens somewhere else.

One RFQ, start to finish: a machined, plated part quoted by hand and with Morsa

This is an illustrative example. The part, the rates and the prices are made up; the steps and the arithmetic are what matter. Swap in your own numbers, or build the same cost stack in our free quote template and calculator.

The RFQ. Tuesday, 8:05. A buyer at an equipment maker emails RFQ 4471 with a PDF drawing: part 22-418, revision C, a shaft turned from 1.25-inch 1018 steel bar, 4.25 inches long, with a keyway and two cross holes, zinc plated clear per ASTM B633. Quantities 500 and 1,000. Quotes due Friday.

By hand, the estimator:

1. Reads the drawing: material, tolerances, thread and finish notes, the plating spec. About 10 minutes.

2. Hunts for something similar in the ERP and the job folders, lands on job 22-406, a shaft made last year, and pulls its routing and how long each operation actually took. About 25 minutes.

3. Calls the steel service center for today’s price on 1.25-inch 1018 bar: $7.50 a foot. About 15 minutes, plus waiting.

4. Builds the routing and times: saw, CNC lathe, CNC mill for the keyway and holes, deburr and inspect. About 30 minutes.

5. Only after steps 1 to 4, late Tuesday, emails the drawing and quantities to three platers. Two reply by Wednesday afternoon; one never does. About 10 minutes, plus a day and a half of waiting and a chase. Our free RFQ template builds that request.

6. Works out the landed cost and price in a spreadsheet. About 15 minutes.

7. Types the quote into the ERP or the Word template, saves the PDF and emails it. About 15 minutes.

That is about two hours of the estimator’s time spread over three days, in line with the up-to-two-hours figure Paperless Parts gives for a single component quoted by hand [1], and about $108 of estimator time at the loaded rate above.

The cost stack the estimator builds:

At 500 pieces the order is worth $9,150 (500 x $18.30); at 1,000 it is $17,630 (1,000 x $17.63).

With Morsa, the same RFQ:

• 8:05. The RFQ lands in the estimator’s inbox. Morsa reads the email and the drawing: part, revision, material, plating spec, quantities and due date.

• By 8:20. It has pulled job 22-406 from the ERP with its routing and actual run times, the shop’s machine rates and the $7.50 bar price from the steel service center’s latest price list (a shop with no list gets the price by email request instead), and has sent the plating RFQ, with the drawing and quantities, to the three platers from the estimator’s mailbox.

• 1:40. In this example, two platers reply the same day. Morsa reads both, puts the lower landed cost in the draft and keeps the other reply beside it; the third plater has not answered.

• 1:45. The draft quote is ready in the shop’s own template, with both quantity breaks and the cost stack above behind each price.

• Before 2:00. The estimator checks the routing against revision C, keeps the numbers, changes the lead time from three weeks to four because Plater A quoted a seven-day turn, and sends the quote from their own Outlook.

The platers still set the pace. Because the plating RFQ went out at 8:20 instead of late in the day, a same-day reply is possible, and then the quote leaves Tuesday afternoon instead of Thursday; if the platers take a day, it leaves as soon as their reply lands, with the rest of the draft already done. Either way, the estimator’s time goes where it counts: the routing, the risk and the price. What stays with people is every decision on the quote: whether to bid at all, the price, the lead time, which plater, and the send.

At J4S, a 120-person glass plant, Morsa went live in two days, and on-time completion of operational commitments rose from about 30% to about 75% across about 900 commitments in four weeks (J4S customer story) [32]. At JRG Automotive, Morsa caught 5 of 8 production-stopping shortages early, saving $2 million.

Pricing works as set out in Morsa’s entry above, starting with a pilot on one live problem such as your slowest outside-process quotes (how pricing works). To see it on your own RFQs, book a demo.

How to test quoting software on your own RFQs

1. Pull 20 RFQs you have already quoted, won and lost, with their drawings, including several with outside processing such as plating or heat treat.

2. Time each one from inbox to sent, by hand and with the tool, counting the days spent waiting for outside-process prices, not only the hands-on minutes.

3. Compare the tool’s cost with what you quoted and with what the job actually cost, line by line.

4. Push a quote into your ERP and change the quantity. Lot minimums and quantity breaks should survive the trip.

5. Ask who maintains the rates, templates and cost models after go-live, and how many hours a week that takes.

Verdict: which quoting software should your estimators use?

If your estimators lose most of a quote to finding the last job, getting material and outside-process prices and typing it up, Morsa is the one to try first: it does that legwork across your inbox and your ERP while the estimator keeps every decision. To try it on one live problem, book a demo.

Choose Paperless Parts if you quote many new CNC or sheet metal parts from 3D models and want geometry-driven costing. Choose SecturaFAB or Tempus Tools for cut parts and welded assemblies, Steelhead if you are the finisher, DigiFabster if you want buyers to price parts on your website, and a CPQ only if you sell configurable standard products. If most of your quotes are repeat parts, start with the quoting module in your ERP; our job shop ERP guide compares them.

Sources

1. Paperless Parts, Quoting software for manufacturing (homepage): https://www.paperlessparts.com/ (read 25 October 2026)

2. SecturaFAB, Homepage: https://get.secturafab.com/ (read 25 October 2026)

3. Reddit r/manufacturing, Need quoting software recommendations (July 2024): https://www.reddit.com/r/manufacturing/comments/1e70n7i/need_quoting_software_recommendations/ (read 25 October 2026)

4. US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Cost estimators, Occupational Outlook Handbook (May 2025 pay): https://www.bls.gov/ooh/business-and-financial/cost-estimators.htm (read 25 October 2026)

5. US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employer costs for employee compensation, June 2026 (released September 9, 2026): https://www.bls.gov/news.release/ecec.nr0.htm (read 25 October 2026)

6. Paperless Parts, Facts about Paperless Parts: https://www.paperlessparts.com/facts/ (read 25 October 2026)

7. Software Finder, Paperless Parts pricing: https://softwarefinder.com/manufacturing-software/paperless-parts (read 25 October 2026)

8. Tempus Tools, Laser cutting software pricing: https://www.tempustools.com/pricing (read 25 October 2026)

9. SoftwareConnect, Steelhead Software pricing, reviews and features: https://softwareconnect.com/reviews/steelhead-software/ (read 25 October 2026)

10. Mavlon, Pricing: the AI Quoting Engine: https://mavlon.co/pricing (read 25 October 2026)

11. Customiser, Pricing: https://customiser.ai/pricing (read 25 October 2026)

12. Kwantflow, Download: free open-source fabrication estimating software: https://kwantflow.com/pricing (read 25 October 2026)

13. DigiFabster, Pricing: https://digifabster.com/pricing/ (read 25 October 2026)

14. Toolpath, AI-powered quoting and CAM automation for machine shops: https://toolpath.com/ (read 25 October 2026)

15. Javelin Technologies (SOLIDWORKS reseller), SOLIDWORKS Costing: https://www.javelin-tech.com/3d/solidworks-costing/ (read 25 October 2026)

16. Ohmycad (SOLIDWORKS reseller), SOLIDWORKS price list USA 2026: https://ohmycad.com/en/solidworks-price-list-usa/ (read 25 October 2026)

17. Cincom, CPQ pricing engine for manufacturing: https://www.cincom.com/cpq/pricing/ (read 25 October 2026)

18. Paperless Parts, Machine readable company facts: https://www.paperlessparts.com/llm-api/ (read 25 October 2026)

19. Paperless Parts, Implementation and onboarding: https://www.paperlessparts.com/implementation-and-onboarding/ (read 25 October 2026)

20. Reddit r/Machinists, Paperless parts (November 2025): https://www.reddit.com/r/Machinists/comments/1p6lbl4/paperless_parts/ (read 25 October 2026)

21. ECI Software Solutions, JobBOSS² estimating and quoting: https://www.ecisolutions.com/products/jobboss2/features/quotes/ (read 25 October 2026)

22. ProShop ERP, Estimating and quoting: https://proshoperp.com/product/estimating-quoting/ (read 25 October 2026)

23. Global Shop Solutions, Estimating and quoting software: https://www.globalshopsolutions.com/estimating-and-quoting-software-for-manufacturing (read 25 October 2026)

24. MIE Solutions, MIE Trak Pro homepage: https://mie-solutions.com/ (read 25 October 2026)

25. DELMIAWorks, Quoting and estimating software: https://www.solidworks.com/product/delmiaworks/manufacturing-erp/erp/sales-mgmt/salesquotes/ (read 25 October 2026)

26. SecturaFAB, Estimating and quoting software for metals manufacturing: https://get.secturafab.com/estimating-quoting-software (read 25 October 2026)

27. Steelhead Technologies, Manufacturing quoting software: https://gosteelhead.com/quoting-order-entry (read 25 October 2026)

28. Mavlon, Manufacturing quoting software: 9 tools compared (October 2026): https://mavlon.co/quoting-software (read 25 October 2026)

29. Customiser, Best manufacturing quoting software in 2026: https://customiser.ai/manufacturing-quoting-software/best (read 25 October 2026)

30. MTI Systems, Costimator manufacturing cost estimating software: https://www.costimator.com/ (read 25 October 2026)

31. aPriori, Pricing and packaging: https://www.apriori.com/pricing/ (read 25 October 2026)

32. Morsa, J4S customer story: https://morsa.ai/customers/j4s (read 25 October 2026)