Frequently asked questions.

What is LumenCount?

LumenCount turns a lighting drawing set into a counted, reviewable fixture takeoff. It reads the luminaire schedule, the AI takes a first pass at counting fixtures on your floor plans, and you review, correct, and mark up every plan before exporting a branded Excel and a marked-up PDF.

It's built for lighting estimators, distributors, and contractors who want to get to a bid faster — without giving up control of the numbers.

How do I get access?

Just sign up. Create an account at lumencount.com — it's free, no invite needed. Everything is unlocked from the start: no card, no trial clock.

What does it cost?

It's free. Every feature — AI fixture counting, manual takeoffs, quoting, submittals, and photometrics — is available at no charge, for your whole team, with no per-page limits and no card required.

Can I add my team?

Yes, and it's free. Invite as many teammates as you like from the Team panel in the app — everyone shares the same workspace, projects, counting, and quoting. There are no seat charges and nothing is metered per page.

How accurate is the AI count?

The AI gives you a head start, not a final answer. It scans each floor plan and proposes a count, but you review every fixture — add what it missed, remove false hits, fix types — before anything is final. The count is never locked in until you say so.

That's by design: you stay in control of the numbers you bid on.

What if my plans tag fixtures by symbol instead of a type code?

The AI count finds fixtures by the type code printed next to them. If your plans tag fixtures only by symbol — with no code at each fixture — the AI can't reliably find them.

For those jobs, use symbol-only / manual mode: skip the AI count and place every fixture by hand on a clean, boxed plan. You get the same markup tools and the same branded export — just a fast manual takeoff.

What file types and trades do you support?

Today, LumenCount works on PDF lighting drawing sets. Support for lighting controls and other MEP trades is on the way.

What do I get at the end?

A branded Excel workbook with a count-by-floor matrix and the full fixture schedule, plus a marked-up PDF of every plan you reviewed — ready to drop into a bid. And the job doesn't stop at the count: the same project carries into quoting and submittals.

Can LumenCount check light levels (photometrics)?

Yes. Once a plan is counted, open Photometrics to lay out each room on the drawing and read the light the counted fixtures deliver — average maintained footcandles by the lumen method, plus a point-by-point footcandle grid with avg/min/max and uniformity ratios. It reads the sheet's printed scale automatically when it can; otherwise you set the scale with two clicks on a known dimension.

Export a per-room footcandle summary, a marked-up plan with the grid and iso-footcandle contours, and an Excel schedule. It's a fast, direct-illuminance check for laying out and sanity-checking a design — a starting point for your bid, not a substitute for a full interreflection study.

Does LumenCount handle more than the count?

Yes — each takeoff lives in a project that carries the whole job. Your counts seed a quoting workspace (add pricing line by line or import your fixture list from CSV or Excel), and from the same project you can build submittal packages and O&M manuals, with manufacturer datasheets and warranties pulled from a shared library.

Takeoffs are versioned, too: save, reopen, and save edits as a new version — so when an addendum drops, V2 doesn't overwrite V1.

Is my data private?

Your drawings live in your own personal or company dashboard, visible only to you. We don't share them or use them to train AI.