MyMiniFactory Acquires Thingiverse, Polls Users to Help Shape New Direction
Prominent model repository Thingiverse joins MyMiniFactory’s larger family of creator sites under the umbrella of SoulCrafted, an anti-AI “movement.” Nothing will change in the short term, but eventually the site will orient itself around new communities of user.
An early twist in 2026’s game of bingo as Thingiverse finally severs all ties from MakerBot (currently a part of UltiMaker) and joins London-based MyMiniFactory, in an acquisition that sees the model repository fold directly into the MMF business structure with senior leadership from the latter assuming control of the former.
The questions on many minds, I’m sure, are: “Why Thingiverse?” And: “Why now?” Looking beyond the headline, it might actually be a match made in heaven.
“It’s the ‘everything’ platform, but it’s the ‘nothing’ platform at the same time. What we’re bringing over is going to be that focus.” — Romain Kidd, CEO of MyMiniFactory
“Over the last few years, MyMiniFactory has really developed a set of values, a playbook around tabletop and miniatures,” Romain Kidd, CEO of MyMiniFactory told All3DP. “We’ve been in touch with Thingiverse over the last few years and the opportunity came to acquire [it]. What we’re trying to do is essentially transpose the playbook that has worked for MyMiniFactory… figure out what communities and content categories are viable to develop these sustainable businesses on Thingiverse.”
From “Everything” to Something: Narrowing the Focus
Thingiverse’s history is a long one; it’s one of few enduring household names in desktop 3D printing, launching as a model repository of things to print by the MakerBot team, during an era that could be described as desktop 3D printing’s 2010 hype bubble. It remained under MakerBot’s wing through the years, following the brand from independent operation, to ownership under Stratasys, and later its merging with Ultimaker.
Its 17-year history has also seen it decline from being the clear and first place to go for free 3D models to print, to one of the top three along with more deeply brand-aligned platforms Printables and MakerWorld.
Throughout this time, Thingiverse picked up a reputation as a neglected platform struggling under the weight of technical debt. UltiMaker turned this around, dedicating resources to fix the platforms and build the foundation for its future. Transparency about the site’s changes came in regular change logs and the dev team’s frequent appearances offsite in forums. Despite this, the functionally better Thingiverse was adrift.
But the MMF team are clear-eyed about this. “What it didn’t have was a clear vision, a direction, and maybe a sense of leadership to actually know what it was doing and know what kind of features to build or what community [it had]” says Kidd, adding “So, that’s the focus more than taking over some technical debt and trying to solve a feature.”
It’s odd to think that despite 17+ years as a product of a 3D printer manufacturer, Thingiverse has remained relatively neutral about the potential hardware tie-in available to it. The closest we ever saw was Thingiverse Education, a K6+ educational curriculum built around classroom-friendly MakerBot hardware and classroom-approved prints on Thingiverse, and later the ability to open a model directly in UltiMaker Cura.
Other manufacturers build moats with their model repositories, community building and gamifying loyalty – think Printables to Prusa, Bambu Lab and MakerWorld. Thingiverse is plainly not like this, but perhaps not by design. “It’s the ‘everything’ platform, but it’s the ‘nothing’ platform at the same time. What we’re bringing over is going to be that focus,” says Kidd.
The War on “Soulless” Content: A Hard Stance Against AI
This may be the appeal, particularly as AI-generated content continues to polarize opinion. MyMiniFactory, and now Thingiverse, is resolutely against it.
“It is a hard stance, indeed, on AI… there’s no future, there’s no sustainable future for Thingiverse as a platform or for independent creators if everybody’s chasing the auto-generated, AI-generated content with less and less added value,” says Kidd. “That’s just going to be a rush to the bottom.”
The anti-AI sentiment may come across as a “marketable moment” for the company, just as its pompous “Metareverse” was. But they may be on to something. As other platforms grapple with the lowered bar for abuse that AI tools enable, bringing Thingiverse into the company’s “SoulCrafted” initiative – rejecting AI assisted or generated content for those fashioned by hand (with “soul”) might bring exactly the kind of identity that’s been missing. How exactly a site can police a “no AI content” policy is unclear, but at least it’s an identity.
Beyond eventually building the environment for communities of creators and giving them the tools to monetize themselves effectively, the exact plan is unclear. For Kidd and company, establishing who exactly the tribes are that inhabit the platform is task number one: “We understand that there’s not going to be one community on Thingiverse, but there’s going to be multiple communities.”
To do that, Kidd and co will be holding a town hall of sorts, inviting Thingiverse users (and prospective users) to engage with them as they attempt to establish who exactly uses Thingiverse and how to make the site a better, more equitable place for them.
“The website is still the number one platform in the world for content sharing online for 3D printing,” he adds. Undeniably, Thingiverse is an asset with massive reach. But a mass of top-of-the-funnel traffic from search does not necessarily a tribe make.
Nevertheless, MyMiniFactory’s biggest strength is its creator infrastructure, letting industrious designers of tabletop gaming pieces and miniatures market and connect their talents and products with a receptive audience. Developing the site to better cater to printable niches and allowing prolific creators to connect with and earn from their fans can only be a good thing, particularly when it comes without the platform abuse effect that site-specific currencies and monetization can bring.
If you’re interested in contributing to new direction Thingiverse takes, you can register to join the Q&A and have your say. It takes place online, on February 17, 2026, at 5 PM GMT (5 PM UTC).
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License: The text of "MyMiniFactory Acquires Thingiverse, Polls Users to Help Shape New Direction" by All3DP is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.