For those that are considering an autorouter... a couple examples to consider

I used to like the idea of using an autorouter, and had incorporated multiple steps to move my KiCAD board into and out of a competing product to make use of its autorouter.

I eventually realized I was spending MORE time cleaning up DRC errors created by the competing product’s autorouter than taking the time to do a proper manual layout from the beginning within KiCAD.

A couple examples of the same board from shortly before I removed the competing product for good.

The autorouted example - note the lack of consistency in routing between similar pins:

And the exact same board laid out in KiCAD (before further fine-tuning):

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Well Done!
Did you lay all those tracks manually, or did you just use copy & paste (or array) to duplicate tracks?
In KiCad a (copy of an) existing track just gets assigned to a new net if it gets attached to another pad. I experimented a bit with this (and more) in:

Those tracks were laid out manually in the second example. :slight_smile:

Zoom in, start the track and make sure it followed the desired path, zoom out a bit, then drag the trace to the endpoint. Lather, rinse, repeat.

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Meh.
Draw one, copy array, finished.

The important thing though is not the method, but the mindset.
In a PCB design program you have the tendency to draw tracks.

If you approach it as a graphical drawing, using Cut & Paste becomes a lot more obvious tools for your toolbox.

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Hello Meterman2026,
What I have noticed is that it is always better to manually route rather than opting for autorouter. Autorouter will just connect the traces from one point to another. These can result in awkward shapes in the board layout. If we do the routing manually we can create the shapes as we want and make the layout look symmetrical. We can also modify the traces. This helps to prioritize our traces as well.

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