2020 Best Budget 3D Printers (Winter Update)

Since most of the cheap 3D printers on this list are Cartesian-style machines, we figured we’d introduce you to this devilish little Delta 3D printer by Monoprice. The Mini Delta is incredibly affordable and offers a unique experience compared to what most are used to seeing with FDM 3D printing technology.

While this type of printer is usually a bit more complicated to put together properly, Monoprice makes this tall task easier with this pre-assembled Mini Delta – take it out of the box and start printing. Also, this Delta printer comes with auto-calibration, a heated bed, WiFi connectivity, and more for under $200.

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Monoprice MP Mini Delta: Review the Specs

The portability the Mini Delta offers comes with a caveat, though; the print bed is positively tiny, so make sure it’ll suit your needs before splashing the cash on one.

The Ender 3 was our previous and long-time sub $200 winner, only being ousted recently by the Ender 3 Pro dropping in price. Nevertheless, the original Ender 3 is still one of the best budget options on the market, offering phenomenal value for your money.

It comes with a heated print bed that measures 220 x 220 with a Z-axis extending to 250mm. Also, its ability to resume a print after losing power is a welcome feature seldom seen in other cheap 3D printers.

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Creality Ender 3 Review: Best 3D Printer in Its Segment

Coming mostly preassembled, the Ender 3 delivers respectable out-of-the-box results for its price point. Better yet, you can hack, mod, and upgrade to your heart’s content plus benefit from a huge and active community of users sharing tips and tricks online.

With the Ender 3 selling like crazy, Geeetech has tried to rattle Creality’s gantry with the Geeetech A10, which boasts of a few new tricks to differentiate itself. For starters, it’s easy to build and offers a slightly bigger build volume (220 x 220 x 260mm) than the Ender 3. It also comes with the “Super Plate,” which is Geeetech’s take on Anycubic’s popular Ultrabase (review here).

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Geeetech A10 3D Printer: Review the Specs

If you look at the specs, the only drawback is the manual calibration – but once that’s accomplished, you have an interesting printer for an excellent price. Geeetech even offers an optional Wifi dongle.

When the Monoprice Select Mini came out in late 2016, it made quite a splash in the pool. For an astonishingly low price, this tiny 3D printer is capable of delivering decent 3D prints. It features a heated bed, and despite its closed looking frame, it is open for individuals to hack it into better shape.

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Monoprice MP Select Mini Review – Great Value for Money

WiFi connectivity as standard marks the Select Mini V2 apart from the crowd in the sub-$200 category. Still, the build plate is tiny compared to our current winner, the Creality Ender 3.

The Creality Ender 3 Pro was our long-time winner of the sub $300 category, but is now widely available for under $200 and therefore dethroned its marginally cheaper sibling and former sub $200 winner, the Ender 3.

Finding the right balance between quality, reliability, and affordability, Creality equipped the Ender 3 Pro with some impressive features, namely a magnetic removable print bed, a sturdier Y-axis assembly, a better extruder, and new bearing wheels.

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Creality Ender 3 Pro Review: Best 3D Printer Under $200

Overall, the Ender 3 Pro is ideal for hobbyists and makers looking to amp their creativity without spending too much. Not to forget the printer’s hackability. There are several ways to upgrade the printer, from a BLTouch sensor for automatic bed-leveling, firmware updates, to various 3D printed add-ons.

If you are just considering the specs, the Tevo Tarantula Pro should play in a different league: It boasts a medium-sized bed, a titan Bowden extruder, and a heated bed running on 24 volts. So, why is the printer so insanely cheap?

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Tevo Tarantula Pro Review: Great 3D Printer Under $300

The reason for its price is quite simple: There aren’t too many features that justify a “Pro” tag. It’s better to think of it as a Tevo Tarantula finally done right. First of all, the Tarantula Pro is now likely to be using stable, tested electronics – mostly borrowed from the Tevo Flash. The frame is more rigid now. And it also can travel at 250 mm/s if you so desire, as Tevo 3D advertises on their brochure. Overall, this is an interesting machine.

The Anet ET4 is a budget FDM printer with many premium features tucked neatly into its all-metal frame. The machine appears unusually wire-free at first glance because most of the electronics are tucked neatly inside its frame, making the modular design easy to assemble, especially for beginners.

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2020 Anet ET4 3D Printer Review: 10-Hour Testing

The printer features a 220 x 220 x 250 mm heated glass print bed with automatic bed leveling, resume print function, a touchscreen, and a filament runout detection. Optional 256-micro stepping Trinamic Drivers are available for the little buck, which – according to Anet – will silent the operating noise further even when on full speed.

With Artillery’s first 3D printer, the Sidewinder X1, the newcomer already made quite the impact.

After hitting the lab, Artillery released a new and smaller model, the Artillery Genius. While it is the downsized version, this only applies to the print bed site. The data and components are similar if not identical.

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2020 Artillery Genius 3D Printer Review: 10-Hour Testing

Without jacking up the price, Artillery equipped Genius with several useful features, such as a touchscreen, an improved Z-axis nut coupler system, a fast heating print bed, and silent stepper drivers. Plus, Artillery left room for DIY-improvements such as the possibility to upgrade it with an automatic bed leveling sensor.

After a short, simple, and well-documented build process, you’ll find yourself with an excellent and reliable Prusa clone at a fraction of the cost. From the moment it landed in the All3DP office, the anycubic i3 Mega has become a permanent fixture.

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Anycubic i3 Mega Review: Great 3D Printer Under $300

Available across the internet around the $250-350 range, the Anycubic i3 Mega provides a sizable print volume, a great adhesive heated bed called “Ultrabase” (more info here), a decent hot-end – this is essentially a plug and play machine for PLA printing. This makes it a great option for beginners on a budget, particularly for those who don’t mind tweaking a bit to improve the overall outcome of their prints.

Take Creality’s screamingly popular Ender 3, sprinkle in a few of the top-line features of the Ender 3 Pro, and then square it out in a boxy, Core-XY-like-but-not-actually-Core-XY frame and you have the Ender 5.

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Creality Ender 5 Review: Best 3D Printer Under $300

Frankly speaking, the Ender 5 is the Ender 3 we wished for. There is room for improvement, but with a little care, you’ll get great prints out of it. Overall, Ender 5 is an interesting and affordable tool for makers, hobbyists, tinkerers, who are willing to spend some time with it. All in all, the printer is an exceptional buy at $500, let alone its new price point under $300.

The FlashForge Finder has been around for quite a while; it’s a cheap 3D printer that offers a build volume of 140 x 140 x 140 mm, which by today’s standards is a bit on the small side.

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FlashForge Finder Review: A 3D Printer for Beginners

Features of note are the Flashforge Finder’s open-face design, full-color display, and wireless connectivity. The package also includes starter filament and a USB stick, which is all you need to get printing right away.

Don’t worry; you are not seeing double. Still, you might ask yourself why is the same printer recommended for multiple budget categories.

After heated discussions amongst the editors, we concluded that with the Ender 5’s recent price-drop just under $300, there is still no better contender in the $500 section that is quite as good as the Ender 5.

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Creality Ender 5 Review: Best 3D Printer Under $300

Hate them or love them, but undeniably Creality does produce some good printers. And the Ender 5 is one of them. If your budget is $500, stick with the Ender 5, you won’t regret it and still have some money in the wallet.

With that being said, Creality did recently release the Ender 5 Pro, a pumped-up version with – what it looks like – undoubtfully useful implementations. However, we have not yet gotten our hands on it for a full review, and therefore restrain from a verdict.

Relatively new to the market of low-cost 3D printers is the Sapphire Pro from the manufacturer Two Trees. The 3D printer kit has a construction volume of 235 x 235 x 235 mm, a size similar to an Ender 3. But the Sapphire Pro has a cube shape and makes its mark with a CoreXY belt setup.

The Sapphire Pro is marketed to midrange hobbyists and beginners and is capable of printing fast, accurate, and reliable, with some high-tech features to boot. The Sapphire Pro is marketed to midrange hobbyists and beginners.

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2020 Two Trees Sapphire Pro Review: 10-Hour Testing

These features include linear rails on the X and Y axes, as well as a dual gear BMG Bowden extruder and a filament monitor for increased reliability.

With this in mind, the Sapphire Pro seems to be quite a bargain, with features typically seen only in printers at least twice its price.

Presumably named and colored after the famous DC Comics superhero, the Tevo Flash is an affordable 3D printer that packs a surprising punch as far as features go.

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Tevo Flash Review: Fun and Fast

It has a Tevo Titan extruder and Volcano hotend, dual cooling fans, proximity sensors, automatic bed leveling, and a super fast-heating AC print bed that seems fitting considering the printer’s name.  It has a modest 235 x 235 x 250mm build volume and is compatible with most standard 3D printing materials, making it well-suited for frugal makers that want a compact machine with a keen focus on speed and functionality.

Unfortunately, Tevo has decided to discontinue the Flash temporarily… so get it while you still can.

The Ender 5 Pro is the pumped-up version of the stock Ender 5. Equipped with the same cubic frame, you get everything the classic Ender 5 has to offer, plus around $50 worth of useful upgrades.

For one thing, the Ender 5 Pro is equipped with a new V1.15 Silent Mainboard, allowing for a quieter and more precise printing performance, as well as a highly durable, metal, extruding unit ensuring a stable feeding of filament.

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Creality Ender 5 Pro Review: The Better Ender 5

Another useful feature that goes hand in hand with the above mentioned new extruder is the upgraded filament tubing. The Ender 5 Pro is now equipped with a Capricon Bowden PTFE Tubing.

The addition of this high-end tubing, plus the new feeding system, make the Creality Ender 5 Pro better suited to print with flexible filaments and other exotic materials.

TEVO was one of the first 3D printer manufacturers to clone Creality’s successful CR-10 for a lower price point. In terms of day to day printing, the Tornado just works. TEVO’s take on the Titan extruder handled everything we threw at it with no sign of giving up the ghost; no stripped filaments or tangles of TPU. That is very much a welcome thing in a printer that comes flat packed.

Tevo Tornado Review

TEVO Tornado Review – A Worthy CR-10 Challenger?

Since then, TEVO has improved the printer with several smaller changes. Improved components and firmware have made the Tornado more reliable. Also, you can modify and upgrade the printer heavily.

There’s one big caveat, though. The 2017 model of our TEVO Tornado review sample was heating its bed directly from AC power. This can lead to serious electrical shocks if the rear bed wires come loose. We can’t tell yet if Tevo has fixed the problem in their 2019 model, but we’ll keep you updated.

The Artillery Sidewinder X1 is a sleek, affordable FDM 3D printer that offers some interesting features.

With a build volume of 300 x 300 x 400 mm, a direct-drive extrusion system, and a volcano hotend, the Artillery Sidewinder X1 handles not only the go-to filaments but also exotics, like TPU, very well. Furthermore, according to Artillery, the printer is even quieter than most enclosed 3D printers, which we found to be partially true in our Sidewinder X1 review.

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Artillery Sidewinder X1 Review: 10-Hour Testing

While the first version of the Sidewinder X1 already had a very fast heating glass print bed, Artillery has listened to user feedback and replaced it with an even faster heating and better adhering Ultrabase-like print bed in their follow up iteration.

The colored, user-friendly touchscreen ensures an easy usage of the Artillery’s main feature set. In addition, it features a resume-print function. Even though it is becoming an increasingly common feature, it is worth mentioning this deal-breaker function.

Creality has released a redesigned V2 version of the popular and bestselling CR-10 3D printer.

The overhauled version is equipped with some impressive features. To eliminate the tedious Z-wobble, the CR-10 V2 comes now with a sturdy triangular frame. An upgraded power supply and motherboard ensure a constant temperature when operating, something the old CR-10 tended to struggle with from time to time.

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2020 Creality CR-10 V2 Review: 10-Hour Testing

Plus, the CR-10 V2 offers the possibility to switch between the default all-metal Bowden extruder or switch to a direct drive extrusion unit.

All in all, the CR-10 V2 does feature some impressive features, but -as with most Creality printers – be prepared to do a bit of tinkering to unleash the printer’s fullest potential.

Derived from the CR-10 — the 3D printer that arguably kickstarted a 3D printing boom in 2017 with legions of imitators but few equals — the CR-10S is Creality’s update, addressing some concerns of the prior machine and adding new features.

Easily found for sub-$400 now, we’ve decided to bump the CR-10S over the CR-10 as our recommendation. You still get a generous build volume of 300 x 300 x 400 mm, as with the CR-10 before it, and a heated bed.

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2019 Creality CR-10 Review: Great & Affordable

Differentiating the CR-10S from the CR-10, however, is the addition of a filament runout sensor — an essential safeguard against the failure of long prints taking up that tall Z-height — power blackout recovery, and a dual Z-axis motor arrangement for greater stability in taller prints.

It’s not perfect, though, but with some tender loving care, few modifications and a good slicer, it’s a great affordable 3D printer.

The Qidi Tech X-Pro is an affordable dual extrusion printer that is ready out of the box. Two features seldom found in budget printers.

Based on the Makerbot Replicator design, the Qidi Tech X-Pro offers an enclosed printing chamber, allow for printing temperature-sensitive materials.

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Qidi Tech X-Pro Review: Editor's Choice 2020

Yes, the sturdy boxed print chamber does somewhat limit the print volume. Still, the Qidi Tech X-Pro is an affordable entry into dual-extrusion printing, even for complete beginners, as the setup is a breeze and can be done by a complete novice.

The CR-10 is a great 3D printer, offering big print volume bang for a relatively little buck. Impressive out of the box performance and an easily hackable framework for user-guided improvement pushed this further, cementing its place as an iconic printer of the last few years.

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2019 Creality CR-10 S5: Review the Specs

Take the above and scale it out to 500mm in every direction, and you’re left with a monster of a printer. Expect to need to tinker to take full advantage of that volume, but for the price to print volume ratio, it’s nearly unbeatable.

The best gets better. We love the Prusa MK3. Most of you love the Prusa MK3. But Prusa Research was all like: “no, we can do better!“. And so they did.

The Original Prusa i3 MK3 Kit boasted near-unparalleled attention to user experience, discerning attention to detail, and more features than you could shake a 3D printed stick at.

Recently updated to the MK3S — Prusaian half-step to a new model number — you get rejigged printed parts, a redesigned easy-access extruder assembly and a switch from optical to mechanical filament sensor to name but a few of the laundry list of changes.

Perhaps the biggest evolution here is the extruder assembly redesign, which paves the way for greater airflow for print cooling and improved performance printing flexibles.

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Original Prusa i3 MK3S Review: Simply the Best

Those languishing with an MK3 can get in on the hot newness of the MK3S with the MK3 to MK3S upgrade kit, which retails for approximately $25. A small investment to live life on the bleeding edge.

If you shy away from the 8 hour build time, you can spend an additional $250 to get your Mk3S fully built. And they even throw in a bag of Haribo gummy bears!

Stop us if you’ve heard this one before; the FlashForge Creator Pro closely resembles the MakerBot Replicator 2X. This cheap 3D printer is capable of dual extrusion and comes with a metal frame, enclosed chassis, and a relatively small print bed.

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FlashForge Creator Pro: Review the Specs

Other features include a platform-leveling system with a metal build plate and a guide rod to help with stabilization and durability. The design is starting to look a bit long in the tooth, but the Flashforge Creator Pro is held dear by the maker community for its reliability, versatility, and ease of use.

So you want it all? A laser-engraver, a 3D printer, and a CNC mill? The Snapmaker has got you covered. The 3-in-1 machine started on Kickstarter, becoming the third most funded 3D printing project to feature on the platform. The not-yet-published successor Snapmaker 2.0 did even better on Kickstarter… but isn’t out on the market yet.

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Snapmaker Review: Best Budget 3-In-1 3D Printer

The company has an interesting system: They utilize interchangeable tool heads — usually, such machines cost more than $2000, but if you can live with a very small print bed, the Snapmaker could be a go-to multitool in your workshop.