Keep one parts library in PartsBox and pull from it inside your EDA tool, so the BOM you export already matches your inventory — the same parts, the same part numbers, the same data. Symbols and footprints stay in your CAD libraries, where they belong; everything else about a component — the manufacturer part number, stock, offers, custom fields — lives in the same database you stock, price, and build from. There is no separate CAD library to keep in sync by hand.
KiCad reads the library over HTTP, through its built-in HTTP library feature. Your parts appear in the KiCad Symbol Chooser, organized into categories you define with PartsBox filters — by tag, name, specification, or custom field — and any PartsBox field can be mapped into a KiCad field. Setup is a generated .kicad_httplib file placed in a KiCad library directory; after that, the library needs no ongoing effort. Press d on a placed component and its PartsBox page opens in the browser.
Altium connects through its database library interface, DbLib. PartsBox presents that connection through Outpost™, an application that runs on your machine as a Docker container, keeps a live copy of your PartsBox database, and exposes the SQL interface Altium expects. Synchronization is one-way: you design against live PartsBox data, but Altium does not write back. Expose the whole library or only a filtered subset — for example, only parts tagged for use in new designs.
For many parts, the exact MPN does not matter at design time, and a BOM line that says only 10k is hard to price and purchase from. Place a meta-part in the schematic instead: it carries the symbol, the footprint, and the design intent, and you decide which of its interchangeable members to buy at purchase time, when price and stock are known. The set of substitutes can change over time without touching the schematic, the PCB, or the BOM.
Because placed components carry their PartsBox identity — the ID Anything™ code — importing the finished BOM matches every line to its part with no guessing and nothing to reconcile. Pricing, purchasing, and builds then work without entering anything twice.
Other EDA tools have no live library connection, but any tool that exports CSV gets the same BOM import, matching, and pricing.
KiCad integration is in every plan, including the free Maker plan. The Altium Designer database library, through Outpost™, is on the Production plan.