Yes pick
Anycubic Photon Mono 4
Anycubic $160 7" 17μm In stock
Now we are talking Anycubic. The name scheme is back on track and this printer gives great quality in an okay build volume and the price is right.
Yes pick
Elegoo Mars 4
Elegoo $160 7" 18μm In stock
This printer is so great. You are paying for no extra features, just raw performance. It is unlikely that the XY resolution will ever get much better than this, so getting a printer like this as a super cheap way to get into printing
Yes pick
Elegoo Mars 4 Ultra
Elegoo $170 7" 18μm In stock
There are suble differences between this ultra version and the non ultra version. I would buy the non-ultra, but would also buy this. Tempered glass protection above the screen is super nice to have. Wifi I do not rate as high. The .goo format has problems with AA, but this Ultra here can do .cbt. instead - so if AA is a must for you, this is the way.
Yes pick
Elegoo Saturn 3
Elegoo $230 10" 24μm In stock
I don’t know man, I am just a sucker for a printer that is cheap and does the barebones very well. You get so much machine for so little money invested. No fancy crap, just close to 20 microns pixel and dead solid printer. Fans shut down when idle… peace…
Yes pick
Elegoo Mars 5 Ultra
Elegoo $270 7" 18μm In stock
Wow, this is a printer. Anycubic tried to make a faster resin printer and ended up creating a much worse product (going to 100 microns, making a quality reducing FEP to make it happen and using brittle fast flowing resin). Elegoo? They made a tilting vat. This thing can print so fast at crazy good quality. I see some issues popping up with the tilt vat failing over time, but so far Elegoo made something unique here. There are also issues with the build plate that holds a ton of liquid resin after printing. It has RERF which was not normal on the Elegoo machines
Yes pick
Elegoo Saturn 4 Ultra
Elegoo $369 10" 24μm In stock
Does support AA while the non ultra does not. Tilting Vat. Great. Speed! Some issues with build plate. Some issues with wires on screen. Auto leveling still does not work great. Big gap on top of build plate is making the post process a bit more funky. USB is on the back. Has a power loss resume function.
For the price? I think you are getting a lot of machine here. But would you rather have two machines that did the same thing, but without the speed and smart stuff?
Yes pick
Elegoo Saturn 4 Ultra 16k
Elegoo $500 10" 19μm In stock
This looks to be a pretty good starter printer, mainly because of the heated VAT. It has some extra features you pay for that you might not need (camera and smart stuff), but getting VAT heated at this price point is super good. The tilt works great.
Yes pick
UniFormation GK3
UniFormation $570 9.6" 19μm In stock
The next printer in the Uniformation line. Biggest thing here is still the heated VAT comboed with the micron size. Amazing printer. A bit expensive. Other features inlcude: UI screen can flip up. Drip hanger system. Easy to replace screen.
Yes pick
UniFormation GK3 Ultra
UniFormation $1100 13.5" 26μm In stock
Damn good printer. Extra features: Easy to change screen. Small dot to see if printer is level. Rails are covered. Can tilt the VAT. LED light bar. Do you want to pay for that big a printer or go down in size with the other versions? Also, still some funky issues with delivery and some durability issues. Not that much better than the last version, but you cannot get that anymore
Yes pick
Elegoo Mars 3
Elegoo $119 6.6" 35μm Out of stock
The Mars 3 is about the generation where I would consider getting it second hand. The Mars 3 Pro is something I think was the best entry level printer for a long time, mainly because the price different was small and the tempered glass was a big bonus. It is a bare bones 35 micron pixel sized printer. Great entry level, but today you can get better
Yes pick
Elegoo Mars 3 Pro
Elegoo $150 6.6" 35μm Out of stock
This thing was a killer for a long time. 35 microns at that price point was just a killer machine. These days you can get better, but this is not bad at all. Tempered glass and otherwise no extra fluff. Carbon filter is okay because you can actually change the carbon. The fans STILL do not turn of when idle on this generation…
Yes pick
Elegoo Saturn 2
Elegoo $209 10" 28.5μm Out of stock
This thing was a beast! The handling was much better than the Saturn 1 and was a better fit for beginners. Pixel size was low enough to be really great, it had tempered glass screen protection. Oh and the price was very quickly amazing. It. Sold. Have been running this beast for a long time now!
Maybe pick
Anycubic Photon Mono x 6ks
Anycubic $200 9.1" 34μm In stock
Super fine stock standard printer. For the right price, sure
Maybe pick
Anycubic Photon Mono M5
Anycubic $210 10.1" 24μm In stock
Pretty standard stock printer. For the right price it is fine. Would much rather have this than the M5S “speed” version
Maybe pick
Anycubic Photono Mono 4 Ultra
Anycubic $219 7" 17μm In stock
In this ultra version you get some improved light stuff, wifi and smart stuff. If the price is right, it is cool enough. Ohhh and ACF film…
Maybe pick
Phrozen Sonic Mini 8k S
Phrozen $255 7.1" 22μm In stock
I should love Phrozen printers more than I do. They stick to the basics with no fluff and extra, and I respect that a ton. Instead of jumping on any speed bandwagon, they just made a cheaper 8k version. The problem has always been that the price is just not low enough, compared to the others. And shipping and tarrifs have been a huge issue when buying from a lot of places with this company (but should be fixed now)
Maybe pick
Elegoo Saturn 3 Ultra
Elegoo $270 10" 24μm In stock
I like the Saturn 3, but not super keen on the extra features on the Ultra version here. I think the added cost is high and the extra features are pretty whatever. The ACF film says they intend this to be a bit of a speed printer, but it’s not. It is just as great as the Saturn 3, but I would not pay extra what little more you get on here.
Maybe pick
Creality Halot-Mage S
Creality $309 10.1" 25μm In stock
This time the S does not indicate a worse product… If you like the features and think creality has enough quality control, might not be a bad buy
Maybe pick
Phrozen Sonic Mini 8k
Phrozen $323 7.1" 22μm In stock
With this machine phrozen again said to costumers “best quality is our game”. What a printer for its time. Expensive, yes. But cool. If pixel size mattered more, it might have sold more units.
Maybe pick
Anycubic Photon D2
Anycubic $400 5.9" 51μm In stock
I like DLP printers and I wish they would become more mainstream and be developed more. First of all the projector (yeah, no screen) is rated for 20.000 hours instead of the usual 20.000 hours of screens. There are also no fans to make noise and the DLP tech is a bit more crisp. So while it is “only 50 microns” it acts more like 30 micron printer. But DLP is often expensive, so they are hard to recommend
Maybe pick
Anycubic Photon Mono M7 Pro
Anycubic $500 10.1" 24.8μm In stock
I do not know what to say here. Anycubic is still trying to make faster resin 3D printing happen by going to a default of 100 micron layer height. I have not had hands on with this machine, but I tried the M5 series that tried to do same thing. That was by far my worst experience in resin 3D printing by a mile. Others are solving speed more elegantly, with less drawbacks and cheaper. Anycubic is losing this generation battle. But, heated VAT is a great feature.
Maybe pick
Anycubic Photon Mono M7 Max
Anycubic $729 13.6" 46μm In stock
Pretty interesting machine. Good to see Anycubic try something new with the heated VAT and everything. Pretty solid. If the price drops, this is great.
Maybe pick
Phrozen Sonic Mighty Revo
Phrozen $800 10.1" 24.8μm In stock
This is Phrozen attempt at going “smart printer”. It has heating which I like, but the heater heats the chamber and not the bed (this is less efficient and it can cause some other issues). The smart features are still in the stage where I don’t really trust them to work all the time, so for me they are not a big bonus. You get some light and the camera in the machine, which is cool enoigh.Not a bad printer, but for the same price I think there are better options in this size and feature range
Maybe pick
HeyGears UltraCraft Reflex RS
HeyGears $850 8.9" 30μm In stock
The printers from Heygears are very divisive. It is a very closed ecosystem, which for some can be a massive deal breaker. You are locked into a specific slicer, maybe resin and so on. What if the company goes under and the server it needs to operate via is not online? Do you have a very expensive brick?
But part of the printing community also comes from the “makerspace”. The ideals are open source and tinkering and modding is fun. I think these printers are pretty cool, but I can also see the argument about how any locked down machine is a bad machine. You have to make up your own mind I guess. For a beginner you do get a LOT of help with a machine like this.
The RS version is a bit cheaper, more plasticy version of the non RS. It does not have heated VAT, but you can buy one
Maybe pick
Phrozen Sonic Mega 8k S
Phrozen $1275 15" 43μm In stock
This is supposed to come “pre-level”, but sometimes it was not. It also has a feature where you can tilt the build plate inside the machine, which is a must have when using such a big build plate (there can be a lot of liquid resin on top of that). This uses the ACF film to try and print faster, which is not something I rate very high. The S is often a term for a cheaper or feature cut down version. That is also true here, but the features cut a extremely minor. I think the S is just a better printer. But this thing is really huge. Do you want to pay for that? Do you need that?
Maybe pick
HeyGears UltraCraft Reflex
HeyGears $1300 8.9" 33μm In stock
The printers from Heygears are very divisive. It is a very closed ecosystem, which for some can be a massive deal breaker. You are locked into a specific slicer, maybe resin and so on. What if the company goes under and the server it needs to operate via is not online? Do you have a very expensive brick?
But part of the printing community also comes from the “makerspace”. The ideals are open source and tinkering and modding is fun. I think these printers are pretty cool, but I can also see the argument about how any locked down machine is a bad machine. You have to make up your own mind I guess. For a beginner you do get a LOT of help with a machine like this.
This version has the holes in the build plate, which can be a benefit but you also need to know a bit about what you are doing. The wave lenght of this printer is also 385nm, which is not the standard wavelenght as most other printers. If you know you need it, it is super cool. If you do not know what that means, it is very unlikely you need to use resin where that is a factor and better.
Maybe pick
Elegoo Mars 4 DLP
Elegoo $190 0" 52μm Out of stock
I really like the DLP printers, but sadly they are not something that I expect to see much off. Because there is no screen it is harder to break. The projector is rated for some insane amount of hours, so it is a long term value investment. It prints better than the micron size suggests, because there is much less light bleed. II think the prints are on par with 30 microns. DLP is cool!
Maybe pick
Elegoo Mars 4 Max
Elegoo $200 9.1" 34μm Out of stock
This is a bit of a weird machine. If you really want a bigger machine than the small 6-7” screens, this is a cheap bare bones option. The Pixel size is a bit on the high end, but not that bad. My biggest gripe is the naming. There was no Mars 3 Max and there will be no Mars 5 Max. So why throw this printer in the Mars line? But for bigger models on a budget, it’s fine
Maybe pick
Phrozen Sonic Mini 4k
Phrozen $270 6.1" 35μm Out of stock
For the longest time this was THE entry level printer to get. 35 microns was unheard of when this came out and it took a good long while for Elegoo and Anycubic to catch up. If only the shipping for this thing was not that damn expensive in the , I might have gotten one. Today? Still a fine machine, but the build volume is tiny. You can likely do better on the use market
Maybe pick
UniFormation GKtwo
UniFormation $650 10.3" 30μm Out of stock
Becauseof the heated VAT, this is a very good machine. The number of issues that removes for a lot of people is insane. But would you pay the price for it? Depends on your location and printer space. Could be upgraded with wifi
Maybe pick
Phrozen Sonic Mega 8k
Phrozen $1400 15" 43μm Out of stock
Is Mega bigger than Mighty? According to Phrozen, yeah. The Mega sizes are BIG printers with a big price tag. There are holes in the build plate to make sure the suction does not get way out of hand. They are supposed to be calibrated, but sometimes they are not. It IS impressive to have such a large printer with a solid sub 50 micron pixel size. But look up images of the build plate compared to others. It is MEGA. Do you need that? Are you willing to pay for that?
No pick
Anycubic Photon Mono X2
Anycubic $179 9.1" 48μm In stock
The pixel size is just too big for this to be relevant really
No pick
Elegoo Mars 5
Elegoo $180 6.6" 35μm In stock
This is a bit of a weird product in the Mars series. The screen is actually worse than the Mars 4, which makes it even more convoluted to know what is what. Upon release the Mars 3 is almost sold out everywhere and this printer kinda replaces that model (same screen), but with more ease of use features. It is good for them to have a 4k entry level printer, but still a strange naming scheme to have. The Mars 5 is just worse than the Mars 4 in terms of pixels. This printer does not support anti aliasing, so that is a bummer. It also has the flawed build plate with a ton of liquid resin resting on top. No thanks.
No pick
Phrozen Sonic Mighty 4k
Phrozen $200 9.3" 52μm In stock
A fine medium sized printer with about 50 microns. Was often too expensive for what you got.
No pick
Creality Halot-Mage
Creality $230 10.3" 30μm In stock
For the price it is not bad. I am just not rolling the dice again with Creality anytime soon
No pick
Creality Halot-Play
Creality $230 8.9" 50μm In stock
Not really anything great to say
No pick
Creality Halot-Mage Pro
Creality $250 10.3" 30μm In stock
Faster than non pro, Maybe better light than non pro, Wifi and cloud stuff. Resin pump… Not for me, thanks.
No pick
Anycubic Photon Mono M5S
Anycubic $270 10.1" 24μm In stock
I owned this printer and hated it so much. I tried to give it a go with the speed feature, the fast flowing resin and the auto leveling. The speed resin is brittle and crap. Printing at 100 microns is just not great. The self-level did not work, compressed everything and even standard resin was much worse on this. No thanks man
No pick
Anycubic Photon Mono M7
Anycubic $300 10.1" 24.8μm In stock
I will never be cool with the ACF, print fast with 100 micron layer height. But maybe this is better than the M5 stuff
No pick
Elegoo Saturn 4
Elegoo $300 10" 24μm In stock
Does not support AA as far as I can tell. This is a bit of a weird one. It does not have the tilting VAT that was this elegoo generations big seller. So it is a printer with more smart features? No thanks, to expensive. Just get a cheaper Saturn 3 or get the Ultra version of this instead
No pick
Phrozen Sonic Mighty 8k
Phrozen $425 10" 28μm In stock
The camera had some issues. They where one of the first with this good pixel size on a bigger printer, but you had to pay to get it.
No pick
Phrozen Sonic Mighty 12k
Phrozen $553 10.1" 24μm In stock
Another printer with rectangular pixels of 19 x 24 µm. More helpful UI. This printer joins a long line of Phrozen printers where they fail to put the most important specs on the product page, forcing me to hunt for it in another places. Anyway, camera is cool and overall a very good package. For me, it always comes back to the sticker price. And you can get basically the same thing for much less
No pick
UniFormation GK3 Pro
UniFormation $670 9.6" 19μm In stock
What you get with the pro version: it is actually a bit more of a machine for features that might not even be relevant to you. The wavelength of the light is different, which should be better for some more exotic resins.
No pick
Elegoo Mars 1
Elegoo $100 5.5" 47μm Out of stock
This was one of those resin 3d printers that kickstarted the consumer resin printing market as we know it. Looking at it with todays standards, it was extremely basic and quite bad. The biggest reason was that the screen was not a mono screen. That meant that the expected lifetime was in the 200 hour range (compared to 2k today) and it took way longer to expose one layer on a non mono screen. I remember running close to 10 seconds exposure time on a normal layer (granted, in the cold). Things took forever to print. Notice that the micron size is pretty low, even though it was a 2k screen. Super small screen size and low build volume. It belongs in a museum.
No pick
Elegoo Mars 1 Pro
Elegoo $100 3.5" 47μm Out of stock
This pro version of the OG Mars was a weird one. A carbon filter inside you could not replace? A build plate with a better surface? USB on the front? Bit higher build volume and better light? These where the days man
No pick
Elegoo Mars 2
Elegoo $100 6" 50μm Out of stock
This was a cheap mono printer and it rocked the world. Wow did this ever bring in the resin revolution as we know it. Look at the pixel size - I could run my Mars 2 today and would have a hard time spotting the difference between those prints and my new printers
No pick
Phrozen Sonic Mini
Phrozen $105 5.5" 62.5μm Out of stock
Phrozens first attempt at a machine was okay. The micron size was pretty huge, but it did have a mono screen. Looking back, this would have been better for me to get than my Mars 1! You should not print with this today…
No pick
Creality Halot R6 2K
Creality $130 6" 50μm Out of stock
Creality printers are weird man. I would not touch this, better things to get. How is this a new generation printer? You can get sub 20 micron pixels for about the same price…
No pick
Elegoo Mars 2 Pro
Elegoo $135 6.08" 50μm Out of stock
For me this was where it all really started. This was my first printer with a mono screen and buy what was that ever an upgrade. I remember the cost difference between the pro and the non pro was pretty big. The pro has slighly higher build volume, the crappy air filter inside (that needed to be replaced, but you could not replace). It also had a non plastic VAT wich was something and then USB on the front and a tiny bit better build plate. But it was a beast of a machine back then
No pick
Anycubic Photon Mono 2
Anycubic $147 6.6" 34μm Out of stock
A bare bones 30ish micron printer for cheap is pretty good. It is outlclassed in terms of other options you can get for the price, but it was pretty good. The only reason I would not recommend it back when it battled the Mars 3 was because the blue UV screen did actually let a ton of light through. Get something better
No pick
Anycubic Photon Mono 4k
Anycubic $159 6.23" 35μm Out of stock
Stock standard. For the right price, sure.
No pick
Anycubic Photon Mono SQ
Anycubic $170 6.9" 50μm Out of stock
What was the point of this Anycubic experiment?
No pick
Anycubic Photon Mono
Anycubic $200 6.08" 51μm Out of stock
The mono in the anycubic naming scheme is likely because it was a big selling part - for these very early consumer resin printers. Now, they all have mono screens.
This is a fine little printer, but you can do much better today
No pick
Creality Halot-One
Creality $200 6" 50μm Out of stock
An extremely basic machine. You can get MUCH better for the same price
No pick
Creality LD-002H
Creality $200 6.08" 51μm Out of stock
A basic no BS printer. Pretty solid, but dated now
No pick
Elegoo Saturn S
Elegoo $200 9.1" 48μm Out of stock
After the Saturn 1 but before the Saturn 2. If you wanted a bigger printer on the cheap, fairly good buy at the time. These days, no thanks. Even used you can find much better stuff.
No pick
Anycubic Photon M3
Anycubic $209 7.6" 40μm Out of stock
New weird Anycubic naming scheme starts here. Suddenly hard to figure out what printer is in what series. Maybe okay, but you can do better at this price.
No pick
Creality Halot Lite
Creality $250 8.9" 50μm Out of stock
I have been burned by creality, so I am negatively biased here. But there is a resin creality are known for their FDM printers and not their resin printers. You can get better in the same price and feature category
No pick
Anycubic Photon Ultra
Anycubic $260 4.6" 80μm Out of stock
DLP printers are cool, but the first generation of them was not that great. Look for a never DLP printer if you are keen on the benefits
No pick
Elegoo Saturn 8k
Elegoo $260 10" 28.5μm Out of stock
This was one of thise weird one off things. Was it the Saturn 1 with a better screen? Maybe. But the Saturn 2 was better and they where often almost the price.
No pick
Anycubic Photon Mono X 6k
Anycubic $270 9.25" 34μm Out of stock
35 microns is decent. But still not great.
No pick
Anycubic Photon Mono X
Anycubic $300 8.9" 50μm Out of stock
Meh
No pick
Creality Halot-One Plus
Creality $300 7.9" 50μm Out of stock
zzzZZZzzz
No pick
Creality Halot-Ray
Creality $300 9.25" 30μm Out of stock
Just a Creality printer
No pick
Elegoo Saturn 1
Elegoo $300 8.9" 50μm Out of stock
Back in the days it was common knowledge that bigger printers where not great to get for beginners. The Saturn was a prime example of that. A 2 screw ball join is not great on a printer this sized, and it was very easy to misalign the build plate with a bit of force applied. If we compare today, it was just quite expensive for what it did really.
No pick
Anycubic Photon Mono SE
Anycubic $350 6" 51μm Out of stock
Pretty ahead of it’s time. But also quite expensive for non relevant features.
No pick
Creality Halot-Sky
Creality $400 8.9" 60μm Out of stock
There are some marketing around it with “AI” features, but not what they do or why you should care. Just skip it
No pick
Anycubic Photon M3 Plus
Anycubic $440 9.25" 34μm Out of stock
Is max bigger than plus? apparently so. Another so so printer
No pick
Elegoo Jupiter
Elegoo $600 12.8" 51μm Out of stock
The original price is a bit misleading. It was actually 600 on Kickstarter, but things get blurry in that space. Really cbig and cumbersome printer. A lot of small errors with this machine, so a classic first in a line of printers. While big is cool, big can also mean big failures. Unless you have a very specific use case, this type of printer is not something I would get
No pick
Creality LD-006
Creality $750 8.9" 50μm Out of stock
Basic and way too expensive printer
Unrated pick
Anycubic Photon Mono M5S Pro
Anycubic $300 10.1" 24.8μm In stock
This is the M5S with a heater and a tiny bit better resolution. The M5S is not for me. Get auto level when it actually works. No thanks
Unrated pick
Anycubic Photon M3 Max
Anycubic $599 13.6" 46μm In stock
Big build plate helps a lot. Resolution could be a bit better and at that price range I think you can do better