3D printing cost calculator
Enter the weight, the time and your electricity tariff. You get the real cost of the part and the price you should be selling it at, broken down line by line.
This calculator needs JavaScript. Turn it on and it works instantly; the rest of the page — how the cost is worked out, the price table and the FAQ — reads fine without it.
- 🔒 Everything is calculated on your device, nothing is uploaded to any server
- No sign-up
- Works with any printer and any slicer
How it works
- 1. Weight and timeYour slicer gives you both. Or drop the .gcode and they fill themselves in.
- 2. Your situationYour tariff, your printer, your hourly rate. Saved if you want.
- 3. Your priceFull cost breakdown, selling price and a quote ready to copy.
How the real cost of a 3D printed part is worked out
Almost everybody works out the cost of a part by dividing what the spool cost by the grams the part weighs, and stops there. That number is the cost of the plastic, and it is usually less than half of the real cost. Three things are missing that you pay for anyway, even if you never see them: electricity, machine wear and the prints that fail.
Material
The easy part, and the only one most people count: the spool price divided by its weight, times the grams in the part. A 1 kg spool at $20 puts the gram at $0.02, so a 60 g part uses $1.20 of plastic. If you want to see how much filament that is in metres, there is the filament grams to metres converter.
Electricity
A desktop printer draws between 80 and 250 W on average while printing, depending on how big the bed is and whether the machine is enclosed. At 120 W for five and a half hours that is 0.66 kWh: about ten cents at $0.15/kWh. Not much per part, but it adds up if you print daily; the 3D printer electricity cost calculator puts it per month and per year.
Machine depreciation
The printer wasn't free and it won't last forever. You spread its price — plus the nozzles, belts and spares you'll buy over its whole life — across the hours you expect it to survive. A $400 machine with a 4,000 hour life costs $0.10 for every hour of printing. This is the number that separates a hobby from a workshop: without it you are giving the machine away with every part.
Failed prints
They come loose, they clog, a support drops off. You pay for that plastic and those hours anyway, so the failure percentage is applied on top of material, power and machine. 10% is a sensible starting point; if you are dialling in a new machine or printing TPU or nylon, push it up.
Your time
Preparing the file, loading the part, pulling supports, sanding and packing. Those are real working minutes and they are charged separately, at your hourly rate. It is the line most people forget and the one that moves the final price most: 15 minutes at $12/h is $3, more than the plastic and the power put together.
A markup on cost is not the same as a margin
This is where nearly everybody trips up when quoting. If your part costs $5.11 and you add a 50% markup on cost, you sell it at $7.66 and make $2.55. But $2.55 on a $7.66 price is a 33% margin on the selling price, not 50%. Both numbers show up in the ticket so you know exactly what you are charging. If what you want is a real 50% margin, the markup has to be 100%.
What markup workshops actually use
For one-off commissioned parts, 40% to 100% on cost is the usual range. On long runs it comes down, because the setup time is spread over many units and the risk is lower. On your own designs, where you put in modelling hours nobody sees, it goes up. The full sum is in how much to charge for 3D prints, and there is a table of twenty worked examples in how much does 3D printing cost.
Frequently asked questions
How much does it cost to print 100 g of PLA?
In plastic alone, about $2 with a 1 kg spool at $20. Adding power, machine depreciation and 10% failures, a 100 g part that takes around 8 hours comes to roughly $3 of production cost.
If you also count your prep and post-processing time, add about $1 for every five minutes of work at $12/h.
How much electricity does a 3D printer use per month?
A 120 W printer running 3 hours a day uses about 11 kWh a month, a little under $2 on a $0.15/kWh tariff.
It is less than people fear: a 3D printer uses far less than an oven or an electric heater, because the heat it makes is small and very localised.
How much should I charge for a 3D printed part?
Work out the real cost first (material, power, machine and failures), add your working minutes at your hourly rate, then apply a markup. For one-off jobs, 40% to 100% on cost is normal.
Never price by grams alone: two parts of the same weight can take three times as long and give you far more post-processing work.
How many metres are there on a 1 kg spool?
It depends on the material and the diameter. A 1 kg spool of 1.75 mm PLA holds about 335 metres; the same spool in 2.85 mm holds about 126 metres.
PETG gives about 327 metres and ABS, being lighter, reaches about 400 metres per kilo.
Does it work with Bambu Lab, Creality, Prusa or OrcaSlicer?
Yes. The calculator doesn't depend on any brand: all it needs is the weight and the time, which any slicer gives you.
The printer dropdown covers models from Bambu Lab, Creality, Anycubic, Elegoo, Prusa and Sovol so the average power fills itself in, and you can always pick «Other» and type your own. The optional file reader understands G-code from PrusaSlicer, OrcaSlicer, Bambu Studio and Cura.
Is my data stored anywhere?
Nothing leaves your device. The whole calculation happens in your browser and there is no server to send anything to.
If you press «Save my settings», your printer, tariff and hourly rate stay stored in your own browser for next time. You can wipe them by clearing the site data.
Can it read the slicer file directly?
Yes, if it is a .gcode, .gco or .g: drop it on the drop zone and the weight and time fill in. The file is read inside your browser, it is never uploaded.
The .3mf and .bgcode formats are compressed and can't be read here without extra libraries, so in those cases export the G-code or type the two numbers in by hand.
Is it free, and do I have to sign up?
It is free and there is no sign-up, no email and no account. The site is paid for by advertising.
You can send the quote it produces straight to a client, over WhatsApp or by email.
More tools and guides
- How much electricity does a 3D printer useWork out your 3D printer's electricity use and what it costs per month on your own tariff. Free and instant.
- Filament grams to metres converterConvert grams of filament to metres by material and diameter (1.75 / 2.85 mm). Instant calculation, no sign-up.
- How much to charge for a 3D printed partPrice your 3D printed parts properly: real cost + labour + markup. Free, no sign-up, with a quote ready to send.
- How much does 3D printing cost: 20 parts with real numbersThe real cost of 20 typical 3D printed parts: keyring, planter, phone stand, gear and more.
- How long does a 1 kg filament spool lastHow many metres and how many parts you get from a 1 kg spool, by material and diameter.
- Density and price of 3D printing filamentsDensity (g/cm³) and price per kilo for the most used 3D printing filaments, with metres per kilo.