Still Great value which ever way you look at it. Revit is 6x more. Archicad = 20x more obviously they are different… but still.
I’m sure it is irrelevant to many people but thought it worth mentioning. As a semi retired person who does freelance work when I feel like it and only creates a few invoices a month, and sometimes none for months, I have one of the cheapest online accounting software packages available. I use it as it keeps track of everything easily and at tax time my accountant links into it and does my tax for me.
My subscription is for the absolute basic options. It costs me more than Sketchup per year and earns me no money, it has also had a price increase yet again.
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I think it‘s way too much.
AI and the surroundings are not an argument for this increase! As me, many woodworkers will think about over if its worth. Especially if one only uses it for 5 or 6 projects a year.
285 was much, but ok for thinking over. Last years increase was a heavy pill. And this years increase, sorry, is way tooooo much!
Regards joerg
One Euro for every breakdown and the software will be free!
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I meant to post this here but it’s also posted below.
Here is the rest of the story -prices are in US$
Here’s is the full history.
I go back with Sketchup v. 1 to the days when they were independent and going to Trade shows giving socks that said Sketchup (yes! I still have 2 unused pairs!! ). This was around 2000ish.
I bought the Sketchup Pro Perpetual Classic License.
Once they went to PRO (cir. 2012) they introduced the maintenance subscription. Still using the Perpetual Classic License.
The subscription was
In 2015 was $95/year.
In 2016 it was $120/year
In 2020 they retired the Classic License support
“As we retire our Maintenance & Support program on November 4th, 2020, your auto renewal will no longer be in effect.”
When it was time for renewal I received this email (6/2/2021)
Get the first two years of a SketchUp Pro Subscription for just $240 — a $358 savings!
When I questioned the change this is what I received from Trimble:
> Because SketchUp has made the decision to discontinue the Classic License, we will no longer be providing a support and maintenance option for that license. You will still have the license that you paid for and any support and maintenance that you have already paid for, but going forward you will no longer have an option to renew that support and maintenance.
*> *
> Because of this, we have decided to offer a discount on our Pro Subscription to those customers of ours that currently have a Classic License. There is no need to migrate if you don’t want to, but we wanted to make it a little easier for those that do want to make that transition.
*> *
> I am hoping that this email provides a better understanding of our last email. If you still have any questions or concerns, please respond to this email and I will do my best to assist.
Of course, we all know that new 3d models and plugins won’t work after a while
So I purchased it.
In 2023, it was still a 2-Year deal, but now it was $299
In 2024, the price went to $349 for 1-Year
Now, in 2025, I will still be able to renew for $349 because of when my renewal is (in a week) but
In 2026 the price increase is already announced and it will be $399.
I agree with both sides of the aisle on this one.
Yes, everything has increased in the past few years. Including cost of labor, etc.
Also, yes, Trimble didn’t hold their end of the bargain. I can see moving from a perpetual license, but those who had it should be receiving some benefit for loyalty.
Now I’m off my soapbox. 
Happy weekend to y’all!
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SketchUp was released in 2000 (I started using it ~2003 or 2004. 2010 would have been after the Google purchase.
DULY NOTED
not a subscription. it was a reduced price for the update to the classic licence.
also, you mean… once they got sold to trimble because google had decided to kill the project 4 years earlier. it’s difficult to compare the google and trimble eras because the goals ond objectives of SU were different. it was a tool mainly maintained to have us make google earth for free-ish. and then it was abandoned. and then it was bought to become the current software.
do we ? don’t they work ? even on this forum, even amongst the long time experts you’ll find people still using older classic licences with their plugins.
when talking price, I usually don’t take discounts into account. you had a discount, two years for the price of one. great. first time I took the subscription (instead of using the classic licence I had access to) I used the black friday discount. good for me. but I don’t take these discounts into consideration when looking at the actual price. I just consider them as luck.
don’t get me wrong, I don’t like inflation, and after these past few years, I even abhor it. I’m in first line teaching new users who — in many cases — are just starting their business and will have to bite the bullet. but still, comparing the pricing system of 15years ago should come with… a comparaison of the actual product.
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Yes, sorry, I meant to say 2000… I’ll fix that
Price was $495 for a long time.
One small complication is that the $120 was described as a subscription by us. I guess it was a subscription to the maintenance and support, but did confuse things a little in 2019, when the actual Pro subscription was released.
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Trump Tariffs obviously !
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And just basic greed! Just like we saw in 2021.
Google SketchUp 2017 Make possibly created this expectation of hobbyists having access to all the features (via extensions), basically for free. It was like an “open source” world. A golden age, indeed.
I liked the idea of SketchUp Shop (now Go) as a middle ground. I am a pro who uses SU daily but I’m also a hobbyist who designs all types of projects using SketchUp. But those projects (home brewing workshop being the latest) are sporadic…a month or so of SketchUpping approx. every year. Nowhere near worth a Pro subscription.
But how to create a “Go” version that’s more useable and attractive for hobbyiests and semi-pros without also opening the door to extensions that produce the Pro features for free/cheap? We do need some technical tools, just not very often, and not for $350/year.
The answer is in two things:
- Make sure that the Web and Go versions include a some useful tools to suit makers and casual users… chamfer/fillet, Selection Toys, etc.
- Enable certain features to be added to Go on a monthly or annual basis. This could include LayOut, Import/exporters, A.I., and a range of powerful extensions. Extension Packs are the way to go…
Hypothetically…
-
Wood Shop Essentials Pack for $39.95/month sounds good to me. It includes Layout so we can export scaled plans and it can do Cut lists.
-
Garden Designers Pack for $19.99/month is a bargain, and ships with some awesome 3d components for plants and paving stones. The A.I. image renderer is super helpful.
-
Kitchen & Interiors Pack for $17.99/month is full of dynamic 3d components, enables A.I. textures and lighting, and has a component Reporter function with a cost estimating. It also has exporters for popular rendering apps like Twinmotion and Enscape, as well as AR/VR integration.
So…I just think it makes sense in SketchUp world for us to pay for bundles of tools or extensions according to our industry and needs at the time.
My grand idea that the Extension Warehouse needs to be set up more like an App Store with access to extensions/products on an as-needed (SaaS) basis , eg monthly. There isn’t much other software out there that is based around ‘extendability’ and could offer this approach.
I dislike that SketchUp Web and Go versions can’t grow beyond the basic toolset…the step to Pro is still too great and too different.
Also, there has been a strong feeling among many Pro users that some of the investment in Pro is not going to features that we see value in. eg A.I, Trimble Connect, AR/VR, Ipad versions, Live components, Pre-design, etc.
Why aren’t those tools offered as paid extensions instead…to keep the price of Pro down a little?
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I’ve never understood this argument that hobbyists or ‘semi-pros’ need or deserve a cheaper version.
My wife trail runs and does these stupid long distances. Her yearly budget for shoes, gear and clothing is more than what SKP pro costs. Add in train tickets and passes for gondolas / lifts / etc., not to mention the trip we took this year to the Azores for her run, or last year when we did an overnight in a holiday apartment… it costs way more than SketchUp. She’s not a pro. Salomon doesn’t discount her shoes. The SBB doesn’t discount her train passes (and she even buys a ticket when the dog goes…).
I do quite a bit of photography (for myself). Sony doesn’t give a ■■■■ that I’m not a pro when a buy my lenses and bodies. And I subscribe to software for image editing, storage and sorting. That hobby costs me more than SKP.
I also paraglide. We won’t discuss that budget.
When we lived in the US I belonged to a maker space to use the wood shop and 3d printer. I joined at a mid tier level so I would have access all day, and I would often do my paying work from the shared studio / work rooms on my laptop. I joined because I missed having my wood shop - but I sold everything except my hand tools when I moved states and didn’t have access to a full heated garage anymore. That maker space cost more per year than SKP.
When I outfitted my wood shop, or bought tools to get household work done - no one asked me if I was a pro or a hobbyist. When I bought some nice maple for the cubbies at home the supplier didn’t have a price for me ‘because I’m just a hobbyist’ - in fact I bet his pro guys that were in there all the time got better pricing than I did…
None of these arguments ever made sense to me… I have hobbies, I pay for things. Sometimes I choose things based on how much I will use them, or what features they have. If a brand or tool doesn’t do what I want at the price I want to pay I look elsewhere.
Google screwed this up by offering it for free and now forever going forward we will have these discussions every year or two.
¯_(ツ)_/¯
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This I agree with…
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Seriously? For what you get it’s peanuts. Look at it this way, Adobe illustrator is like 29 bucks a month. And it’s just 2D. You can design and build a whole building with SketchUp. Autocad is way more expensive. Also, it tacks with the cost of everything else going up. How much is plywood now? That’s up at least 33% and it’s getting worse whereas SketchUp is getting better and better
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But if the price of SketchUp is going to increase, then the basic native tools that are absent, should be added. As the price goes up, the software should get better.
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What native tools are absent? If they were native they’d be included no?
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The list is long, and has been mentioned by many users in the past. An example of what I’m currently dealing with is the inability to instruct the line tool to draw a line perpendicular to a line or surface that is on a different plane. In 1989 I had this ability in AutoCAD, but now in 2025 I still don’t have it in SketchUp. When I’m talking about native tools, I’m talking about the basic CAD tools necessary to construct 3D models. Another example is being able to draw a line tangent to a circle or an arc. What’s upsetting is that the list is far longer than it should be. All this attention to AI and rendering, while ignoring the addition of basic CAD tools is persistent, and all the more irritating as the price goes up.
SketchUp is not CAD… as we’ve been round and round before in another thread.