Kicad PCB auto placement and auto routing

Hello,

I am new to Kicad. I like to know if it is risky if I choose auto placement and auto routing in kicad pcb . It must be obviously faster than doing above manually. Does it have any disadvantages?

Thanks in advance

Shhys

It can be obviously faster to automatically place components until you realize a first pass on placement/routing is often not ideal. Auto routers will go for the shortest connect-the-dots (pads) approach; sometimes this is fine, sometimes not.

Does the auto placer know to put bypass caps close to their IC? What about placing to minimize a certain trace length? Does the auto placer know to keep those components handling 110VAC away from the 1.8VDC rail? Etc.

Auto placement requires a lot of effort up front giving weights to various nets. Experienced humans are more efficient at placement, orientation and multi-part unit selection than any software that I have used.
Autorouters are more competitive these days

Thank you for replies.

I dont use auto place or route.
It’s better to group components together that have a close relationshipb so that it is easier to debug a board problem.
And I like to control track routes so that power tracks are as direct as possible and signal tracks avoid noise sources.
I start a board with the enclosure outline, then place connectors.

A post was split to a new topic: Autorouting and autoplacement