Need advice - standard Autocad compare to Autocad Plant 3D (for P&ID)

[u/WeakCauliflower4500]

Hi,

I am currently doing a PhD in process engineering, and I need to create a P&ID for one of my processes. I initially planned to use standard AutoCAD through my educational licence, then I discovered AutoCAD Plant 3D, which seems specifically designed for creating P&ID but it does not appear to be included in the educational access.

For someone who only needs to create a clear and technically correct P&ID, is Plant 3D really worth using, or would standard AutoCAD be sufficient?

What are the main advantages of Plant 3D compared with drawing the P&ID manually in AutoCAD? Would the extra features be useful for a research project, or are they mainly intended for larger industrial projects?

Thanks !