Desktop metal 3D printers are suddenly everywhere. Here's which ones you can actually get.

Ten companies now sell or take reservations for metal printers small enough for a bench, and four advertise prices under $10,000. Here's where each one really stands, what it takes to run one, and what to do if you need a metal part this month.

Dreaming3D, San Diego. Published November 14, 2026.

For twenty years, a metal 3D printer meant a six-figure machine in a room of its own, with a gas supply, a powder station and a trained operator. This year that started to crack. At least ten companies are now selling, pre-selling or taking reservations for metal printers small enough to sit on a bench, and four of them advertise prices under $10,000.

That is a real change. It is also mostly a promise for now. We couldn't confirm a single production unit of the sub-$10,000 machines in a paying customer's hands. The closest is Metal-Base, which has beta machines running at customer sites. The cheapest machines with a published price that you can order today cost about $33,000 and $39,000.

All3DP's Carolyn Schwaar laid out the field on November 14 in Why Desktop-Size Metal 3D Printers Are Suddenly Everywhere, which is the starting point for this post. We checked each machine against its maker and the trade press, corrected two figures that have drifted, and added what a small shop in San Diego actually needs to know: what it takes to run one, and what to do instead while the field shakes out.

All ten, sorted by what you can actually get

Here's every compact machine in All3DP's roundup, checked against its maker or a trade outlet that read the maker's pages. Prices are what each company advertises; status is what we could confirm.

Sorted by advertised price. Euro and pound prices with All3DP's dollar conversions. Status is our reading of public information on November 14, 2026; sources are linked in the machine notes below.

Machine by machine

You can order these now

Mastrex MX100, $39,000. A US company's entry machine: a 100 × 100 × 80 mm chamber, one 300 W laser and 20 to 60 µm layers (Prism News, Metal AM). Distributor Tech-Labs sells it as a training system for schools and labs (Tech-Labs). One thing to know if "made in the USA" matters to your purchasing: 3DPrint.com found that several Mastrex models closely resemble machines from China's Tianhong, the MX100 included; Mastrex told the outlet it is moving to more domestic components (3DPrint.com).

Lasefinity FusionX, £24,999. A UK startup's machine, launched at TCT 3Sixty in June with the most powerful laser in this group: 500 W, with a beam spot adjustable from 50 to 200 µm, in a 100 × 100 × 80 mm chamber (TCT Magazine). All3DP says it can be ordered but no customer installations have been reported yet.

2onelab 2Create Desktop, price on request. A German dental-lab machine: 300 W laser, 100 × 80 mm build, 40 µm layers, air cooled, cobalt-chrome, titanium and stainless (distributor brochure). 2onelab already sells larger 2Create systems, which gives this one an established buyer even if new-model deliveries aren't documented.

Ohsung System Gauss MT90, price on request. The odd one out: no laser and no loose powder. It extrudes a metal paste at room temperature, with a HEPA filter on board, in 316L, copper, titanium and aluminum. It went on sale in Korea in August 2025 and was a CES 2026 Innovation Award honoree (Metal AM). The printed part still needs a separate sintering furnace (All3DP).

Pre-orders, with machines already printing

Scrap Labs Scrap 1, $14,200 kit or $17,990 assembled. The one that should interest anyone who runs plastic printers. Founder Matt Woods came from SpaceX and Xact Metal, and the machine's frame is built almost entirely from FDM-printed parts (3Dnatives). It uses a 200 W, 915 nm laser, a 100 mm cube chamber and open-source Klipper firmware, and it debuted at the Rocky Mountain RepRap Festival rather than an industry trade show (3D Printing Industry). Scrap Labs says a prototype test cube reached an estimated density above 99%. First shipments are targeted for early 2027 and the production launch for June 2027 (Makers101).

Metal-Base Metal 1.0, €9,000. A Dutch machine that skips the usual fiber laser and mirror scanner for a 60 W, 445 nm blue diode laser on an XY gantry. It prints 316L, Inconel 718 and bronze, and it's floor-standing rather than benchtop (Metal AM, 3DPrint.com). Its Kickstarter early-bird price was €8,500. Beta machines are running at customer sites (3DPrint.com counted six in the spring; All3DP says five), and the company has published tensile results from outside testing (All3DP).

Campaigns and reservations

SnowX SnowPod, $5,299 launch special ($9,299 MSRP). From Suzhou, China: an 80 × 80 × 100 mm chamber, 316L stainless, a 40 µm laser spot, sealed powder cartridges and an optional NitroPod generator that makes nitrogen from room air. The NitroPod bundle is $5,899 at launch pricing or $9,999 at MSRP (3Dnatives, 3D Printing Industry). It has been shown printing at trade shows. Two caveats: nothing has been delivered yet, and SnowX ran sponsored articles about the SnowPod on All3DP and 3DPrint.com in September, so treat its performance claims as marketing until owners report back.

Studio 3e8 Mesa 1, $3,500 early-bird. The cheapest machine here, and not a laser printer. It lays down a metal powder and a scaffold powder from sealed cartridges into a crucible inside its own furnace, which then sinters the part; the company says it runs from a standard 120 V outlet. Carbon steel and copper only at launch. Build volume, cycle time, the post-early-bird price and a ship date haven't been announced, and the density figures so far come from a company reply on Reddit rather than a data sheet (Makers101). The Kickstarter opens December 1.

The maker says it's ready

Global Laser Box DP-C1, $4,888. A 300 W air-cooled fiber laser in a 500 × 515 × 830 mm cabinet, pitched at consumers, schools and print farms (All3DP). GLB says the machine is ready for volume production and delivery, and it raised about $30 million in September (Metal AM). It's a real industrial printer maker. But we haven't found an independent test, and the marketing still leans on AI-generated imagery. We wrote up the safety questions in June in Metal printing in your garage? The GLB DP-C1 and the wall of AI renders, and nothing published since answers them.

Desktop-sized, but built for dental labs

Kings 3D DiMetal-100, price unannounced. A Ø120 × 100 mm chamber, a 300 W ytterbium fiber laser, stainless, cobalt-chrome, titanium and tool steel. It also weighs 140 kg, stands a meter tall, and per All3DP needs three-phase power, inert-gas purging and reactive-powder handling (All3DP). It's a good example of a compact industrial machine, and a bad example of something to put in a spare bedroom.

Why now?

The parts got cheaper. Mastrex's Fridland told 3DPrint.com that about three years ago, component prices fell far enough, and LPBF-specific parts like software and laser optics matured enough, to build a capable machine for much less (3DPrint.com).

Designers stopped copying factory machines. Metal-Base swapped the fiber laser and galvo mirrors for a blue diode laser on a gantry. SnowX's founder had his engineers build both a gantry and a galvo system, then went with the galvo (3Dnatives). Scrap Labs prints its own frame and runs Klipper. That's the RepRap playbook, applied to a much harder process.

The old entry level fell apart. Desktop Metal, which once sold an "office-friendly" metal system, went through bankruptcy and liquidation in 2025, and Markforged has been part of Nano Dimension since April 2025 (Nano Dimension filing). That's context, not proof of cause, but it left room at the bottom of the market.

Crowdfunding works for printers. Snapmaker's U1 raised more than $20 million on crowdfunding (Tom's Hardware). Metal makers have noticed. The difference is that a late plastic printer is an annoyance; a metal printer with an unfinished safety story is a different kind of risk.

What the price tag leaves out

All3DP's sharpest point is that the real comparison isn't a $5,000 printer against a $200,000 one. It's the full cost of a reliable, finished metal part: labor, consumables, failed builds, maintenance and post-processing. Here's what that looks like line by line.

Who should buy one, and who should wait

If you're in San Diego

From where we sit in Carmel Valley, three local realities matter.

Our marine layer. That GLB spec of under 75% humidity is a line coastal San Diego mornings can cross. A metal printer here belongs in a conditioned room with sealed, dry powder storage, not a garage that breathes the morning fog.

Garages and rentals. Before a powder machine goes into a garage, a rented suite or an HOA unit, talk to your fire marshal, your landlord and your insurer. A $5,000 machine that voids your lease is not a $5,000 machine.

Who here could use one. San Diego has exactly the users these machines target: dental labs, university and community college programs, jewelers, and small shops supplying aerospace and defense. For most of them, a print service is still the faster path to a finished metal part today.

We'll be plain about our own limits: Dreaming3D doesn't print metal, and we don't make flight hardware, load-bearing or safety-critical parts, firearm components, or medical devices that touch patients. What we do is the step before the metal order, which is where a lot of expensive mistakes get caught. We scan the part you have with a Revopoint MetroY, rebuild clean CAD, and print fit-check prototypes in PETG or resin ($7 an hour of machine time for FDM, $9 for resin) so the file you send for metal is right the first time (how scan-to-part works). Then you send it to an online metal service. JLC3DP, for example, lists laser-melted 316L stainless and TC4 titanium (JLC3DP).

Common questions about compact metal printers

What's the cheapest metal 3D printer you can buy right now?

The lowest advertised price is Studio 3e8's Mesa 1 at $3,500 for an early-bird kit, but its Kickstarter only opens December 1 and it has no ship date. Among machines with a published price that you can order from a maker today, the FusionX (£24,999, about $33,000) and Mastrex MX100 ($39,000) are the least expensive. Everything under $10,000 is a campaign, a reservation or a pre-order.

Can I put a metal 3D printer in my garage?

Some are sized for it. Running one there is another matter: laser powder machines need inert gas, careful powder handling and storage, and often more power than a garage circuit has. Combustible metal powders fall under NFPA 484, which fire codes reference. Talk to your fire marshal, landlord and insurer first, and read our look at the GLB DP-C1 for the safety questions to ask.

What's the difference between LPBF, SLM and DMLS?

They describe the same family of process: a laser melts or fuses a thin layer of metal powder, a recoater spreads the next layer, and the part grows inside a powder bed under inert gas. Laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) is the general name; SLM and DMLS are older names that some companies still use.

How strong are parts from these small machines?

Mostly unknown so far. Scrap Labs says a prototype test cube reached an estimated density above 99%, Metal-Base has published tensile results from outside testing, and Studio 3e8 has claimed over 98% density in a Reddit reply. There is no independent, like-for-like comparison yet. Until there is, treat these as prototyping machines, not a source of certified parts.

Can I print metal on my Bambu or Prusa with metal filament?

Two different things get called metal filament. Metal-filled PLA (copper-fill, steel-fill and so on) is plastic with metal powder in it, good for looks and weight, not metal strength. Bound-metal filament is mostly metal powder held in a binder; it prints on a capable FDM printer, but the part has to be debound and sintered in a furnace before it becomes metal, and it shrinks in the process.

Is Desktop Metal still in business?

No. Desktop Metal filed for Chapter 11 on July 28, 2025, a few months after Nano Dimension completed its court-ordered acquisition, and a judge approved a liquidation plan in September 2025. Markforged, the other big name in office metal printing, has been owned by Nano Dimension since April 2025.

Should I back a metal 3D printer on Kickstarter?

Only with money you can afford to lose. Crowdfunded hardware often ships late, and metal adds safety and support questions a plastic printer doesn't have. Before you pledge, ask for unretouched sample parts, safety documentation for powder and gas, a parts and service plan, and a realistic delivery date.

Does Dreaming3D print metal?

No. We print in plastic (FDM at $7 an hour of machine time, resin at $9), scan and model parts, and repair 3D printers across San Diego County. For metal, we help you get the design and fit right in plastic, then you order the metal part from a print service.

Would you put money down on a sub-$10,000 metal printer now, or wait for the first owners' reports? Tell us on Instagram at @dreaming3dprinting.