Enter your slicer’s material mass and print duration for one print attempt. Include supports, brims, rafts and purge material in the mass. This calculator does not estimate duration from volume. Use one currency throughout; CU means currency units. Defaults are illustrative inputs, not typical prices or measured printer specifications.
Use grams for both material mass and net spool filament mass, excluding the empty spool. Enter decimal hours: 5 hours 30 minutes is 5.5 hours. Use measured average power over a representative print where possible. Machine hourly cost should cover your chosen depreciation and maintenance allowance, excluding the separately entered electricity and labour. Count hands-on preparation and finishing time as labour, rather than unattended printing time.
Masses, currency amounts and rates use labelled numeric quantities. The fixed 1-hour and 1-kWh reference inputs convert duration and energy into quantities for multiplying by hourly and electricity rates; leave them at 1. Percentage inputs use percentage points: enter 90 for 90%.
Spool mass must be positive, success rate must be between 0.1% and 100%, and margin must be between 0% and 99%. Other costs, durations and material mass may be zero. Bounds are calculator limits, not claims about realistic printing conditions. An unavailable result means an input or calculation is invalid; it does not mean zero cost.
Let m be slicer mass in grams, M the net spool mass in grams, S the spool price, t the print duration in hours, W the average power in watts, e the electricity price per kWh, r the machine cost per hour, l the labour hours and w the labour rate.
- Material cost = (m / M) × S.
- Energy in kWh = W × t / 1000.
- Electricity cost = energy × e.
- Machine cost = t × r.
- Labour cost = l × w.
- Attempt cost A = material + electricity + machine + labour.
The input approach follows Prusa’s 3D Printing Price Calculator, which accepts print time and filament weight. The power-time conversion follows Virginia Tech’s energy-use guide.
The following are explicit modelling assumptions and algebraic derivations for this calculator. If s is the successful-attempt fraction, expected cost per success C = A / s: over N attempts, total cost is N × A and expected successes are N × s. Every attempt is assumed to consume the same material, electricity, machine time and labour. This can overstate costs when failures happen early or finishing labour is incurred only on success. Set success rate to 100% to exclude retries. Each successful attempt represents one finished item; do not enter a multi-item build plate unless you intend the result to price the whole plate.
For target margin g as a fraction of selling price P, g = (P − C) / P, so P = C / (1 − g). This is margin, not markup: a 25% margin requires dividing cost by 0.75. Profit here means price less the included costs. Packaging, delivery, platform fees, taxes and other overheads are excluded. Calculations retain precision until display rounding.
| Quantity | Default example: 90% success | Same job: 100% success |
|---|---|---|
| Slicer material; spool price and net mass | 100 g; 25 CU per 1000 g | 100 g; 25 CU per 1000 g |
| Print duration; average power; tariff | 5 h; 120 W; 0.30 CU/kWh | 5 h; 120 W; 0.30 CU/kWh |
| Machine rate; labour | 0.50 CU/h; 0.25 h at 20 CU/h | 0.50 CU/h; 0.25 h at 20 CU/h |
| Material cost | 100 / 1000 × 25 = 2.50 CU | 2.50 CU |
| Energy and electricity cost | 0.600 kWh; 0.18 CU | 0.600 kWh; 0.18 CU |
| Machine and labour cost | 2.50 CU + 5.00 CU | 2.50 CU + 5.00 CU |
| Total per attempt | 10.18 CU | 10.18 CU |
| Expected cost per successful print | 10.18 / 0.90 = 11.31 CU | 10.18 / 1 = 10.18 CU |
| Price at 25% margin | (10.18 / 0.90) / 0.75 = 15.08 CU | 10.18 / 0.75 = 13.57 CU |
| Price less included cost | 3.77 CU | 3.39 CU |
Draft production flag: no registered thumbnail asset was supplied. Create and register a 400 × 400 pixel WebP thumbnail, then insert it as the first image block before activation. Use a cheerful yellow five-point star mascot floating with hands and no separate legs or feet, a white background, and playful navy, blue and teal graphics showing a filament spool, 3D printer and cost symbols. Inspect neighboring tool thumbnails before creating the artwork. No asset ID has been invented.