Crew care: the best construction management apps

Construction managers wake up with their phones practically smoking. It's a flurry of messages, missed calls, emails, and texts. What's delayed? Which materials are missing? Where's the cryptologist who'll decipher these notes? Fortunately, help is available.

If you're a building professional left in a daze, take five in a porta-potty and check out these top-rated apps.

Fieldwire

Price: $0 – $94  p/m

This software eliminates confusion, delays and costly mistakes often plaguing building projects. Fieldwire also makes construction easier by offering: 

Task management

Fieldwire is built for speed while bringing structure and clarity to projects. With real-time push notifications and handy work assignment features, you can keep the conversation flowing, ensuring vital jobs aren't missed.

Field management

Users can share plans, discuss work, and stay connected regardless of location. Manage punch lists and inspections while sharing the right information with teams. Looking to boost your productivity and stay organized? Optimize your work with quick task creation, easy file sharing, and seamless uploads. Feed information onto mobile devices and complete work with notes, photos and videos.

Reporting

Report from the job site quickly. Use customizable templates to share your progress with top brass.

Worried about device compatibility? No problem. Fieldwire is available for Android and iOS, and connects to SharePoint and Google Drive. You can access everything offline, so you're never unplugged from projects.

Lumin

$19-$199 per month

This app actually came from a construction site: an engineer was so frustrated by blueprints and other important documents getting lost that he invented a way to do it on a tablet. Today, Lumin is a document management and editing system optimized for fieldwork.

Centralized storage

Lumin is a cloud-based app that stores all your team documents in one place (or in folders of your choice). It can also sync with Google Drive – so if you’re already storing work there, you can keep doing so.

No caps on team members

Lumin charges for productivity, not people. This means you can add as many team members as you like to your account. The plan price is affected by what features you need and the number of documents you’re going through.

Offline mode

Working onsite can mean being offline. No worries. Lumin has an offline mode that works on its mobile app, so you can keep checking over your documents when the WiFi goes out – no matter what device you’re using.

Editing PDFs can be a pain in the axe. Lumin is designed to cut through the bluster and give you everything you need in one place: PDF editing tools, storage, feedback and fieldwork-friendly apps.

And yes, it has a free plan.

Safesite

Price: $0 – $20 p/m

Construction sites are like a game of Tetris. Except the blocks are huge and way more dangerous. So your team needs to take care. But here's the thing: old-school safety procedures are no longer cutting it. They leave workers vulnerable and exposed to risk.  

That's where Safesite comes in:

Safety management
Ditch the paperwork. Safesite lets you run through safety protocols from its app: add hazards,  log incidents and meetings, and take stock of equipment – all online!

Analytics

Safesite lets you collect and analyze safety data, allowing you to spot trends and reduce dangerous incidents as you work. 

Mobile app

Safety is everyone's responsibility, right? Well, now it’s a responsibility your team will get mobile reminders about. Safesite lets your team report issues and complete checks from the field; no more stress from surprise inspections.

So what about the cost? Safesite offers flexible pricing plans to fit any budget, and its free plan lets you start on safety right away.

Autodesk Construction Cloud

Autodesk Construction Cloud price: by quote

BuildingConnected price: by quote

Even seasoned hard hats struggle with project delays. Crossed wires, budget overruns, and safety issues can all affect project timelines. They can also destroy morale, not to mention your bottom line.

If you want to deliver flawless projects with no redos, Autodesk can help. 

Project management

Autodesk is the Marie Kondo of construction management – it keeps projects clean and streamlines office-site collaboration, plus has more than 400 integrations so you can rest assured it’ll work with what you’ve got.

Bidding and estimates

BuildingConnected Pro lets you fire off bids faster than your foreman leaves for lunch. A few clicks and boom – your invitations are out the door. With features like bid leveling and analytics, you can run the numbers and choose the best project subcontractors. Estimators will love it, as BuildingConnected has custom bid forms to shape invitations – no more vague quotes or missing information.

Cost control

Enjoy cloud-based cost control and manage spending from one place. Autodesk links your main contract to your suppliers and tracks costs in real-time, so you can spot overspending and make adjustments on the fly. That means no more budget overruns or last-minute scrambles to find extra cash.

Building is a tough gig. Autodesk Construction Cloud ensures your project stays on track from start to finish, and you get your money back in 30 days if it's out of plumb.

So there you have it: four cost-effective, customizable construction apps to help you smooth operations, keep your team happy and win more projects.