Product data: the conformance check
Product data is standard manufacturer literature — cut sheets, catalog pages, performance tables — marked up to show exactly what will be furnished. It exists for catalog products: fixtures, devices, valves, membranes, boards. The review question is narrow: does this specific model, with these options, meet the specified performance? That makes product data the fastest review of the three, and also the most markup-sensitive — an unmarked catalog page showing six variants cannot be conformance-checked and comes back 'Revise and Resubmit' on formatting alone, no matter how correct the underlying product selection was.
Shop drawings: the interpretation check
Shop drawings are drawn for this project — rebar bends, duct routing, switchboard elevations, curtain wall sections, millwork details. They exist where the design must be translated into fabrication, and the review question is broader: did the fabricator correctly interpret the design, do dimensions reconcile, do the interfaces with adjacent work function? Broader question, longer review, more comments, and higher stakes: an error caught after fabrication is scrap, not a returned carton. Where the drawings carry engineering (sprinkler hydraulics, curtain wall structure), they arrive sealed as delegated design and the reviewer checks conformance with criteria rather than redoing the math.
Samples: the appearance check
Samples are physical: carpet and tile pieces, paint drawdowns, brick, anodized chips, wood veneers, sometimes full mock-ups. They exist because appearance cannot be verified from a data sheet, and the approved sample becomes the contractual standard the installed work is judged against — which is why the returned, tagged sample gets kept somewhere safe until closeout. Sample review runs on its own clock: it involves owner and designer taste, sometimes multiple rounds of selections, and it should be launched early precisely because it is the least predictable of the three review paths.
One section, all three — and the register consequence
A section like 09 30 00 (tile) is typical: product data for tile and setting materials, shop drawings for patterns and layouts at feature areas, samples for every color and finish. Track them as separate line items with separate dates, because they will not move together — data can be approved in a normal cycle while samples wait weeks on an owner decision, and releasing the order before the sample approval locks the colorway is a classic self-inflicted wound. Submittal.App registers each required type per section and assembles the document side in minutes, so the paper never waits on the paperwork, and the sample tracking rides the same register instead of living in someone's memory.