Five Powerful Reasons to Check Out the AEC Data Model at AU 2025

AU 2025—happening September 16-18 in Nashville, TN or virtually at a laptop near you—is just around the corner. Architects, Engineers, Contractors, and Owner professionals (AECO) will have the opportunity to connect with experts to learn about the latest technologies and strategies, including recent trends and software updates that are shaping the future of the industry.

This year’s AU is expected to be uniquely impactful. With key themes including data, a focus on the ‘I’ in BIM, AI, and digital transformation through digital twins and industrialized construction, AU is posed to deliver. Sessions will highlight topics such as:

• The potential of the AEC data model to democratize data through APIs

• How AI is being integrated to provide insights and automated workflows

• The industry’s ongoing shift from CAD to BIM and cloud-based platforms

While AI has been a hot topic at AU for a couple years, this year will begin to show real, accessible use cases and value. However, as interesting as AI can be to many industries, AI is still built on a foundation of accessible, trusted, and connected data. Enter the AEC data model.

The AEC Data Model – Driving Efficiency by Democratizing More Data

We are excited to share the latest capabilities we are building to help AEC firms realize more value from their data through the Autodesk AEC data model. The AEC data model, a cloud-based system that breaks down large BIM files into smaller, granular pieces of data, provides a unified language and API for accessing and sharing information across the AECO project lifecycle.

Perhaps what excites me most is to see the expansion of data available through the AEC data model ecosystem, and the ways and means through which this growth is benefiting customers across the industry. You can see this on full display at AU 2025. Read on to learn how to begin doing more with your data.

Without further ado, here are five of the many exciting reasons to check out the AEC data model at AU 2025:

1. The Extensibility API Public Beta is Underway!

The Autodesk AEC Data Model API provides a direct connection to the underlying AEC data model. We are taking the first step to decoupling authoring applications such as Revit from remaining the sole tools available for contributors to access model information.

Our AEC Data Model API Extensibility public beta unlocks the ability to programmatically extend your projects’ data, allowing you to attribute your own custom property data outside of an authoring environment. This extensibility capability can unlock significant changes to how properties across authoring tools like Revit are created and populated. End users can append information to a model element or property without that information residing in the model and increasing the file size.

Customer input is critical to ensuring we build solutions that work for you and your organization. Our beta process allows early access to our newest capabilities to test out and provide feedback before they are generally released. Join the beta now to get engaged with your data in a whole new way and explore powerful capabilities coming through increasingly data-driven digital project delivery. Need some inspiration?

• Read the recent blog post highlighting everything about the new extended properties public beta

• Have a look at some of the cool experimentation happening already with Extensibility in the AEC Data Model API

• Head over to the Autodesk Platform Services YouTube channel for an additional demo and overview.

2. Geometry Data is Now Available in a Newly Launched Public Beta

In the spirit of continued growth of the data supported in AEC data model, we’re excited to share that geometry data is now available in public beta!  Earlier this week we opened up a public beta program that allows you to begin accessing geometric data in a multitude of ways and grows upon the private beta program conducted earlier this year.

Customers can now seamlessly access Revit 2025+ geometry data through the AEC Data Model API and Data Interoperability SDK, making it easier to query, export, and integrate geometry into everyday workflows. What does this look like, you may ask?

• Optimized Retrieval: Manual exports of full models are time consuming and error prone. With the AEC data model, you can retrieve only the geometry subsets you need (e.g., all walls), saving time and reducing errors.

• Improved Connectivity: Moving geometry between applications is often clunky. With IFC (geometry-only, for now) export and granular in memory mesh objects, you can easily bring the right data into your tool of choice for visualization, coordination, quality checks, and collaboration.

• Future-Ready Insights: Consistent, API-accessible geometry enhances AI-driven workflows across the project lifecycle.

Join the beta program to learn more and begin testing the new capabilities and be sure to inquire more about the program when you see our team in Nashville.

3. Increased Sync Frequency for Revit Data

You may recall at AU 2024 in San Diego we showed a proof-of-concept capability to increase the sync frequency of Revit data to the AEC data model. Further, in May of this year at Autodesk DevCon 2025 in Amsterdam, we committed to soon bring this to beta so customers could begin deeper engagement with the functionality. In June, we formally launched a private beta program.

The new capability allows users to access element data refreshed with each Sync with Central action performed in Revit. So, every time the model is saved back to the Autodesk Construction Cloud, the data read by the API can be refreshed. Now, not only will you see more data, such as geometry, available in the data model, but you can access it more immediately during project delivery.

Access to the most current information in the AEC workflow is critical for improving data quality and consistency. This drives better, more data-centric decision making, and enhances team collaboration and design iteration by providing frequent access to work-in-progress design data.

There’s a lot of exciting news to come soon regarding the next steps with this powerful new capability.

4. Extended Properties in Model Coordination

We’re continuing to refine and enhance Extended Properties capabilities via Model Coordination and the AEC data model. The beta program continues to expand, allowing more users access the exciting in-product experience.

ACC Model Coordination customers can add custom properties to their model elements directly within ACC. The properties will be stored in the AEC data model and remain associated to their elements throughout their lifecycle.

Users will benefit from a more connected handoff between the design and construction phases of their projects and reduce redundancy and duplication of models while preconstruction processes like model conditioning play out. Customers benefit from:

• Bringing your own custom data to the model conditioning process

• Conducting custom analyses and advanced project workflows without editing the source model

• Improving collaboration and reduce redundancy in design models

• Querying your custom property data directly from the AEC data model GraphQL API

As this scaled beta continues to grow, we’re excited this week to show you some in-development capabilities that push this effort to the next level by making these customer properties visible in other tools.  Join our AEC Data Roadmap session to learn more!

5. Model Analytics Beta

We’re excited to be running a beta program for Model Analytics – an Autodesk-integrated version of UNIFI’s Project Analytics tool. In early August, we began a private beta portion of this exciting and powerful model health solution.

Autodesk Model Analytics (AMA) empowers AEC teams to improve project outcomes and reduce downtime by unlocking near real-time model health without opening Revit. It brings to customers many important health checks and analytics capabilities, including but not limited to:

• Access to historical snapshots of Revit model health data to track project evolution 

• Analysis of trends and performance across your entire portfolio to improve project outcomes 

• Gaining visibility into data by identifying problematic model issues early using custom scoring and dashboards for insights-without manually pulling data

• Replacing ongoing manual export monitoring and troubleshooting in spreadsheets with on-demand dashboards updated to the latest Revit sync

That is just the beginning. AMA enables BIM managers, project managers, and designers to reduce downtime in design, improve visibility and control of their design processes, and expand collaboration across teams and companies.

Our team will have more exciting announcements at AU regarding some immediate next steps with AMA, how to get involved in using the solution, and demonstrations of the new, ACC-integrated capability.

That’s not all…

Those five items are exciting, but we haven’t stopped there. There are so many other exciting advancements we’re making in the AEC data model, including:

Content Catalog

Our commitment to this cloud-based digital content management solution is as strong as ever. Since launching the ACC-integrated system last year, we’ve continued to build resiliency and customer value at scale in all regions supported. We’ve also got exciting new functionality coming soon, such as Revit materials support, as well as the ongoing beta for Content Requests. If you haven’t had chance to try out Content Catalog recently, there’s never been a better time!  Join us on-site in Nashville next week to learn more.

Custom Fields in ACC Submittals via Parameter Service

With a platform focus, we’re working on new capabilities which use the Autodesk Parameter Services to bring a more consistent user experience to managing custom fields and attributes in ACC, starting with the Submittals module.

Plant 3D Property Data

There has been wonderful collaboration in recent months to bolster the collaboration between the AEC data model and Plant 3D. Expect exciting news to come at AU about the next phase of these capabilities and how customers can get engaged.

AEC Data Model Public Roadmap

This is only the beginning. The AEC data model will grow to address more authoring tool data types, such as Civil 3D and Forma, as the model continues to expand functionality. We will also begin to add data validation workflows to the toolkit.

The AEC Data Model Public Roadmap further highlights our strategic product focus areas, as well as where we are headed. Check it out to explore what we plan to work on next and vote on the new functionality that is most important to you. And join us Wednesday, September 17 at 8:00 a.m. CT for the AEC Data Model Roadmap session to learn about these items and more! It will be one of many sessions showcasing the value and direction of the AEC data model.

I look forward to seeing many of you at AU 2025.