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Both run in the browser. What separates them is the shape of the free tier, the materials covered, and what each tool publishes about its results.
By Cutlist Evolution ·
We build Cutlist Evolution, so the useful thing we can offer here is discipline about sources. Our side of the comparison comes from our own published pages and plans. Cutlistor's side is drawn only from wording published on cutlistor.com, read in July 2026 and quoted as theirs. Where their material makes no claim about something, this page says "not published" rather than guessing either way. Vendors change their pages, so check theirs before deciding on a detail that matters to you.
Cutlist Evolution's free tier: unlimited calculations of up to 40 parts each, unlimited stock, 3 saved projects and PDF export. Cutlistor's published free tier: 3 calculations a day, a 20-item cut list limit, CSV and XLSX import capped at 5 rows, 3 AI scans and 3 CAD imports a month, no saving and no inventory, with no login required. The caps land on different users. A daily calculation cap bites anyone iterating on a design, and a per-calculation parts cap bites large one-off projects. Pricing for the paid tiers lives on each tool's own site.
Cutlist Evolution optimises sheet, linear and roll materials, and a separate true shape nesting optimizer covers irregular contours. Cutlistor publishes sheet goods and linear stock, described in their words as 2D nesting of rectangular parts and 1D length nesting. Roll material is not published. If you cut fabric, vinyl or other roll stock, that is a concrete difference to check.
Both tools import from spreadsheets. Cutlist Evolution takes typed parts, spreadsheet and CSV import, and 3D models from Fusion 360 or Shapr3D. Cutlistor publishes CSV and XLSX import, AI scanning of plans from photos or PDFs, and 3D CAD import of glTF, GLB and Collada files. Their AI scan and CAD import are capped at 3 each per month on the free tier.
Cutlist Evolution exports PDF on every plan, CSV on Pro and above, and SVG, DXF and PTX with beam saw settings on Expert and above, plus printable QR-coded part labels and settings for table, beam, panel and circular saws. Cutlistor publishes PDF and DXF downloads, with part labels shown on the PDF diagrams. On cut geometry, their guides describe rips and rows layout methods that align with guillotine-style production, their phrasing, rather than an enforced guillotine constraint. Edge banding, trim margins and saw-controller formats beyond DXF are not published on their pages. An API is not published either. Cutlist Evolution's engine is available as a REST API through SmartCut.
Cutlistor publishes team plans of up to 5 seats with owner, admin and member roles and central billing. Cutlist Evolution has organisation accounts whose members inherit the organisation's plan, with a shared material and stock cloud database on the Enterprise plan.
Feature lists cannot tell you which tool needs fewer sheets for your job. Only counting can. We have not yet run Cutlistor through the published head-to-head suite, so this page claims nothing about their sheet counts or solve times. What we can point at is our own record, measured the hard way: across 2,083 real production jobs the engine behind Cutlist Evolution lands on the fewest stock physically possible 82% of the time, typically in under two seconds, with the results at smartcut.dev/benchmarks published in full, ties and losses included. When Cutlistor joins that suite, its numbers publish the same way. In the meantime both free tiers are enough to run your own cutting list through each and count.
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The switching-focused view is at the Cutlistor alternative page. For the rest of the field, see the best cutlist optimizers in 2026, the CutList Optimizer feature comparison and its shorter comparison landing.