What Should I Charge for a 3D Print?

Most 3D-print sellers start with the same formula: weigh the part, multiply the grams by the cost of a spool, and double it. It feels like pricing. It isn't.

The "filament × 2" method ignores every cost except material — and material is usually the smallest part of what a print actually costs you. This guide walks through what really goes into a price and ends with a worked example you can follow for any print.

Why filament weight is the wrong starting point

A spool of PLA costs $20 and weighs 1 kg, so your filament is $0.02 per gram. A 50g model: $1.00 in filament. Double it: $2.00.

That sounds like a profit. Here's what $2.00 doesn't cover:

• The electricity running the printer for 4 hours
• The wear on the hotend, belts, and build plate
• The one-in-eight print that fails at hour three
• The 30 minutes you spent slicing, starting, removing supports, and packing
• The bubble mailer and thank-you card
• The Etsy listing fee, transaction fee, and payment processing cut

Add all of that up and the true cost of a "$2.00-filament" print is closer to $8–12. Sell it for $2.00 and you're not making money — you're paying your customer to take your prints.

The seven costs in every print

1. Material

filament grams used × (spool price ÷ 1,000)

Include purge waste if you're printing multicolor — it can match or exceed the model weight on AMS prints. The AMS purge waste guide covers how to handle it.

2. Electricity

printer watts × print hours ÷ 1,000 × your kWh rate

A Bambu A1 averages around 100–130W during a print. A 4-hour job at $0.15/kWh costs about $0.07 — small per print, meaningful across hundreds. Full electricity math here.

3. Machine wear

Hotends, nozzles, build plates, belts — they all wear out. A common rule: $0.01–0.02 per gram of filament covers most FDM printers including consumables and depreciation.

4. Failed-print buffer

Even a well-tuned printer fails sometimes. A 10–15% buffer on your material + electricity + wear cost covers those losses without eating your margin.

5. Labor

Your time has value. Even if you don't pay yourself a salary, ignoring labor is how sellers work for free. Charge a fixed amount per print, or track hours and multiply by your hourly rate. How to price your time →

6. Packaging

Bubble mailers, boxes, void fill, labels, tape. Even $0.50–2.00 per order adds up across hundreds of shipments.

7. Design fee (if applicable)

If you modelled the part or adapted a file, charge for that time. It doesn't disappear because you didn't invoice it.

Turning cost into a selling price

Once you have your total cost (all seven lines added up), apply a markup.

Multiplier method: price = total cost × multiplier

Print type	Typical multiplier
Simple single-color PLA	×3
Multicolor / AMS	×4–5
Custom / commissioned	×5+
Bulk / wholesale	×2–2.5

Margin method: price = total cost ÷ (1 − target margin)

Most sustainable small print businesses target 60–75% margin. A 67% margin means every $1 of cost becomes ~$3 in price.

Worked example

Customer wants a 50g PLA figurine. Print time: 4 hours. Labor: 30 minutes.

Line item	Calculation	Cost
Material	50g × $0.020/g	$1.00
Electricity	110W × 4h ÷ 1,000 × $0.15	$0.07
Machine wear	50g × $0.015/g	$0.75
Failure buffer (12%)	($1.00 + $0.07 + $0.75) × 0.12	$0.22
Labor	0.5h × $15/h	$7.50
Packaging	—	$1.00
Total cost		$10.54
Suggested price (×3)		$31.62

That's a very different number from the $2.00 you'd get from filament × 2 — and it's the number that lets you stay in business long-term.

Adjusting for your marketplace

If you sell on Etsy, Shopify, or eBay, platform fees take another 10–15% off the top. Calculate your target take-home first, then gross it up for fees. Marketplace fee breakdown →

The quick way

Doing this math by hand for every product is tedious. The 3D Print Pricing Calculator handles all seven costs at once — enter your filament price, model weight, print time, and profit target, and it builds the breakdown and suggests a price in seconds. Free, no account needed.