The Top Resins of 2026: Every Category, Every Use Case, One Definitive Guide

The resin market in 2026 is extraordinary and overwhelming in equal measure.

Walk into the photopolymer aisle — figuratively speaking — and you'll find hundreds of options across dozens of brands, each with a specification sheet full of tensile strength ratings, elongation-at-break percentages, Shore hardness values, and cure time claims that are simultaneously precise and difficult to compare. Every brand says their resin is the best. None of them tell you what best means for your specific application.

That's what this guide is for.

We've organized the top resins of 2026 by use case — not by brand loyalty or sponsored placement — because the right resin for a dental aligner is completely different from the right resin for a tabletop miniature, which is completely different from the right resin for an engineering prototype that needs to survive real mechanical stress. Knowing the category is as important as knowing the product.

Here are the resins that are actually delivering in 2026, across every major application area.

First: How to Read a Resin Specification

Before the picks, a quick orientation — because the numbers that appear on resin data sheets can be confusing if you don't know what they mean in practice.

Tensile strength (MPa): How much pulling force the cured material can withstand before breaking. Higher is stronger. Standard resin: ~35–50 MPa. ABS-like resin: ~50–70 MPa. Engineering resin: up to 84 MPa and above.

Elongation at break (%): How much the material stretches before it snaps. Standard resin: 5–15%. ABS-like: 20–40%. Flexible resin: 100%+. Higher elongation = more flexibility and impact resistance.

Shore hardness (D scale): Resistance to surface indentation. Higher numbers = harder. Standard resin typically 75–85D. ABS-like: 80–90D. Flexible resins fall into the Shore A scale (softer materials).

Shrinkage (%): How much the part contracts during curing. Lower is better — less shrinkage means more dimensional accuracy. Most quality resins sit at 3.5–4.5%.

Viscosity (mPa·s): Thickness of the liquid resin. Lower viscosity flows more freely into fine details and around support structures. High-detail resins trend toward lower viscosity.

Keep these in mind as you read the picks that follow.

Category 1: Best Standard Resins — The Everyday Workhorse

Standard resins are the entry point: affordable, widely compatible, available in the broadest range of colours, and well-suited for display pieces, decorative models, prototypes that don't need to survive mechanical stress, and anyone learning the medium for the first time.

🥇 Elegoo Standard ABS-Like Resin 2.0

Elegoo's ubiquity in the consumer resin market is earned rather than accidental. Their current ABS-like 2.0 formula has raised the bar for what "standard" means — delivering toughness and detail quality that would have qualified as a mid-tier product three years ago at a price that makes buying by the four-litre bundle genuinely economical.

The 2.0 formula's low-odour profile is the standout improvement over its predecessor. Long printing sessions in smaller spaces are noticeably more liveable. Detail resolution is excellent — fine surface textures, sharp edges, clean bridging between fine features. Colour range is comprehensive, and the white and grey shades paint and prime beautifully.

Best for: General printing, display models, prototypes, learning the medium, high-volume print runs where cost efficiency matters.

The caveat: Standard resins aren't particularly durable under mechanical stress. For anything that will be handled repeatedly or used as a functional component, step up to ABS-like or engineering.

🥈 Anycubic Basic Photon Resin

Anycubic's standard formula is the closest competitor to Elegoo in the volume-printing space, and in several respects it edges ahead. The low shrinkage rate — among the lowest in the standard category — makes it an excellent choice for dimensional accuracy work where parts need to fit together precisely. Layer adhesion is consistent, failed print rates are low, and the material releases from FEP cleanly with well-calibrated settings.

Available in a wide colour range, with the translucent variants being particularly well-formulated — clear prints with minimal cloudiness and good UV transmission for light-piping applications.

Best for: Dimensional accuracy, budget-conscious printing, prototyping, translucent and clear prints.

Category 2: Best ABS-Like Resins — Toughness Meets Detail

ABS-like resins are the most important category in 2026 for the broadest range of users. They solve the core limitation of standard resin — brittleness — while maintaining the surface quality and detail resolution that makes resin printing worth doing in the first place.

The name refers to their target property profile: toughness and impact resistance similar to ABS filament, combined with resin-quality surface finish. In practice, the best ABS-like resins significantly exceed what traditional ABS can deliver on surface quality while delivering mechanical properties that standard resins can't approach.

🥇 Siraya Tech Fast ABS-Like Resin

Siraya Tech continues to make a name for itself among resin enthusiasts by producing a resin that avoids the typically brittle resin properties with their ABS-like formulation — a tough, durable option that's designed to take knocks and bumps yet retain its structural integrity.

The "Fast" in the name delivers on its promise partially — curing times are marginally shorter than average, which compounds across a long print session. The real selling point is the material's behaviour after printing: parts that flex rather than shatter under impact, thin features that survive handling, and a surface quality that rewards painting and finishing with exceptional texture and detail rendition.

Siraya Tech Fast ABS-Like resin's ABS plastic-like properties make it wear-resistant, more rigid, easy to post-process, and less brittle than other resins in the market. The slightly lower odour profile compared to standard resins is a genuine quality-of-life improvement for regular printing sessions.

Best for: Tabletop gaming miniatures, functional display models, any print that will be handled, cosplay accessories, anything painted and displayed.

🥈 Anycubic ABS-Like Pro 2

The Anycubic ABS-Like Pro 2 resin bundle offers over 100% greater elongation at break than traditional resins, making it perfect for structural models. The low-viscosity formula flows easily, reducing layer separation and improving detail accuracy. With better adhesion to build plates, you'll see fewer failed prints.

The elongation improvement over standard is dramatic and genuinely felt in use — parts that would have cracked on removal from supports instead flex and survive. For anyone who has lost detailed miniatures to support removal stress, this formula is the answer. The mild scent makes extended print sessions in home environments genuinely manageable.

Best for: High-detail functional models, miniatures where support removal is critical, structural prototypes, anyone frustrated by brittle print failures.

🥉 Elegoo ABS-Like Pro 3.0

Elegoo's latest ABS-like iteration takes their already strong standard formula and adds meaningful mechanical performance improvements. Shore hardness sits at 86D — resisting cracking and deformation, making it ideal for parts that need durability, with high fluidity and low viscosity cutting print times without sacrificing detail or texture.

The standout feature is its performance-to-price ratio within the ABS-like category. For users who print in volume and need reliable toughness without paying engineering resin prices, this is the value benchmark.

Best for: High-volume ABS-like printing, prototyping, mixed-use workshops, budget-conscious durability.

Category 3: Best Engineering Resins — When Real Performance Is Required

Engineering resins are designed for applications where "it looks like it works" is not good enough — functional end-use parts, jigs and fixtures, housings, mechanical components, and anything that experiences real force, heat, or chemical exposure.

These are more expensive, more demanding to print correctly, and less forgiving of poor calibration. But when the application demands it, nothing else delivers.

🥇 Liqcreate Strong-X

The Liqcreate Strong-X boasts one of the best tensile strengths on the market at 84 MPa. It's stiff, heat resistant, and is compatible with SLA, MSLA, and DLP resin 3D printers. For an engineering resin at its performance tier, the pricing is competitive — most resins delivering these mechanical properties carry significantly higher price tags.

Strong-X is the engineering resin that community testing keeps returning to when the question is "what's the strongest reasonably affordable resin I can get?" The answer, repeatedly, is this one.

Best for: Functional engineering parts, jigs and fixtures, structural components, tooling aids, anything requiring genuine mechanical performance.

🥈 BASF Ultracur3D Rigid RG35

BASF Ultracur3D Rigid RG35 offers superb rigidity and durability while also being reasonably flexible. It's also moisture resistant and has a solid 49 MPa tensile strength.

BASF's engineering pedigree shows. This material handles real-world mechanical and environmental conditions in ways that consumer-tier engineering resins don't always deliver. The moisture resistance opens up applications in challenging environments that most resins can't reliably service.

Best for: Industrial prototyping, production tooling, moisture-exposed applications, anything requiring BASF-level material certification.

🥉 Phrozen TR250-LV

The Phrozen TR250-LV is specifically designed for engineering applications. In addition to high strength and hardness, the resin has increased heat resistance, capable of withstanding heating up to 150 degrees.

150°C heat deflection temperature is significant — it opens the door to applications near heat sources, under-hood automotive parts, oven-adjacent fixtures, and anything requiring thermoforming of the printed part itself. An unusual and valuable engineering property that most resins at this tier can't match.

Best for: High-temperature applications, automotive prototyping, thermoforming masters, any application requiring genuine thermal stability.

Category 4: Best Flexible Resins — When the Part Needs to Move

Flexible resins occupy a unique position in the ecosystem: they produce parts that standard and engineering resins structurally cannot. Gaskets, seals, grips, wearables, hinges, snap-fit joints, anatomical models — applications where the material needs to deform under load and return to its original shape.

🥇 Elegoo Flexible 3D Printer Resin

Elegoo's flexible formula delivers consistent Shore A hardness across the range of the print, which is harder to achieve than it sounds — many flexible resins produce inconsistent hardness between areas of different wall thickness. Excellent layer bonding prevents delamination under repeated flexion, which is the failure mode that claims most flexible prints before their time.

Good clarity is available in the clear variant, opening up applications in light-piping, decorative pieces requiring translucency, and anatomical models where internal features need to be visible.

Best for: Gaskets and seals, wearable components, flexible props and cosplay, snap-fit joints, anatomical demonstrations.

🥈 eSun eFlexible Resin

You can use this resin for products that must be strong and flexible at the same time, making it suitable for engineering prototypes or functional models. eSun's formula handles the strength-flexibility balance well — a challenge that causes many flexible resins to fail either at the "strong" end (too brittle to flex properly) or the "flexible" end (too soft to hold meaningful shape under load).

Compatible with a broad range of MSLA and DLP printers, well-calibrated across the major consumer printer brands without requiring exotic settings.

Best for: Functional flexible prototypes, soft-touch grips, mixed-rigidity assemblies, anything requiring the flexible-but-structural combination.

Category 5: Best Castable Resins — For Jewelers and Metal Casters

Castable resins serve a specific and demanding application: they replace wax in the lost-wax casting process, burning out cleanly when invested in casting plaster with minimal ash residue. The cast void left behind replicates the printed geometry in molten metal — gold, silver, platinum, bronze, or any castable alloy.

The requirements are precise: low ash content (ideally under 0.1%), clean burnout cycle without residue that contaminates the casting, low shrinkage for dimensional accuracy, and detail resolution sufficient for jewelry-quality surface finish.

🥇 ESUN Castable Resin

ESUN Castable is designed for direct casting in dentistry and jewelry. The finished products are smooth and firm. When burned out, ash content is practically absent, and high precision allows it to be used for the manufacture of crowns, bridges and other products for subsequent casting.

The near-zero ash content is the headline spec — contamination from ash residue is the leading cause of surface defects in cast jewelry, and a resin that burns completely clean produces consistently higher-quality castings. Community feedback from jewelry studios confirms that ESUN Castable's burnout performance is among the most reliable in the category.

Best for: Fine jewelry casting, dental crown and bridge casting, investment casting of intricate parts, any application requiring clean metal reproduction of printed geometry.

🥈 Phrozen Wax-Like Dental/Jewelry Resin

Phrozen Wax-like Dental Green is a low shrinkage, zero ash wax-like resin. Due to the low shrinkage, the finished products are very accurate, and the matte surface helps you to see even small imperfections.

The wax-like surface texture is a practical advantage beyond aesthetics: it allows imperfections to be spotted and corrected before investing, the same way wax models are inspected before casting. For jewelers transitioning from traditional wax carving, the tactile and visual feedback is familiar and reassuring.

Best for: High-accuracy jewelry prototyping, dental casting, complex geometric jewelry forms, studios transitioning from traditional wax workflows.

Category 6: Best Dental Resins — Where Precision Is Clinical

Dental resins operate in a category defined by biocompatibility, regulatory compliance, and dimensional accuracy requirements that exceed most other applications. Dental and medical resins are biocompatible, used for creating dental models and surgical guides, with properties that must be carefully validated for patient contact applications.

This is a rapidly evolving sector — new formulations are being introduced continuously as the dental industry's adoption of in-office 3D printing accelerates.

🥇 Formlabs Dental Model Resin V2

Formlabs' dental model resin is the professional benchmark — FDA-cleared, dimensionally accurate to clinical tolerances, and specifically formulated for the production of study models, aligner thermoforming models, and diagnostic casts. The company's closed ecosystem (Formlabs printers, Formlabs resins) means the material-printer calibration is tighter than any open-market alternative.

Expensive by volume compared to hobbyist resins. Justified by the clinical accuracy and regulatory clearance that dental application demands.

Best for: Clinical dental models, aligner production models, dental lab workflows requiring FDA-cleared materials.

🥈 SprintRay ABS Temp Crown Resin

For dental practices producing same-day temporary crowns and restorations, SprintRay's temporary crown resin delivers the biocompatibility, strength, and stain resistance required for in-mouth placement. Polishes to a high gloss, provides accurate margins for well-calibrated printers, and is available in multiple shade values for aesthetic matching.

The same-day crown workflow — scan, design, print, cure, fit, cement — is transforming chairside dental practice in 2026, and materials like this are why it's clinically viable.

Best for: In-office temporary crown production, same-day restorations, dental labs scaling chairside workflows.

Category 7: Best Water Washable Resins — For Beginners and Shared Spaces

Water washable resins trade some mechanical performance for workflow simplicity — no IPA, lower fumes, faster cleanup. They're the right choice for specific users and specific environments. (For the full pros and cons breakdown, see our dedicated water washable resin guide.)

🥇 Elegoo Water Washable Resin Plus

Elegoo's water washable formula has narrowed the quality gap between washable and standard resins more than any other consumer product in the category. Detail resolution is genuinely competitive with their standard formula, the colour range is broad, and the improved formulation reduces the moisture sensitivity issues that plagued earlier water washable products.

For beginners, educators, apartment-based printers, and anyone running a shared workspace where IPA handling is impractical — this is the reference product.

Best for: Beginners, classroom and makerspace environments, small-space printing, display and decorative models where ease of cleanup outweighs maximum mechanical performance.

🥈 Anycubic Water Washable Resin

Anycubic's water washable formula delivers reliable adhesion and consistent layer bonding that reduces the failed-print rate that affects some water washable products. For a beginner resin, the quality floor is high — prints come off the plate well-formed, surface detail is solid, and the cleanup workflow is genuinely as simple as the marketing describes.

Best for: Entry-level resin printing, gifted printers still learning the workflow, any situation where minimal post-processing is a priority.

Category 8: Best High-Detail Resins for Miniatures — The Painter's Choice

Miniature printing has its own performance requirements distinct from engineering or display applications: extreme surface detail at small scale, low layer line visibility, sufficient toughness to survive support removal without losing fine features, and surface properties that accept primer and paint without filling the details you worked to achieve.

🥇 Siraya Tech Blu

Siraya Tech's Blu formula has achieved near-legendary status in the tabletop miniature community, and a session with it explains why. The material's formulation produces exceptional surface resolution — fine texture, sharp edges, individual hair and fabric folds rendered faithfully at 25–32mm scale — combined with a toughness that far exceeds standard resin.

Support removal is where Blu truly distinguishes itself. The slight flexibility of the formula allows thin protrusions — outstretched weapon arms, finger details, antennae — to survive support separation that would snap them in standard resin. Primers adhere excellently. The cured surface accepts washes and drybrushing in a way that rewards careful painting.

Best for: Tabletop RPG and wargaming miniatures, competition painting pieces, high-detail display models, any application where 32mm-scale surface quality is the primary priority.

🥈 Phrozen Aqua 8K Resin

Formulated specifically for use with high-resolution 8K and above printers, Phrozen Aqua 8K unlocks the full resolution potential of modern mono LCD screens. On a Saturn 4 Ultra or equivalent 12K printer, the detail achievable with this formula is objectively extraordinary — textures that require a magnifying glass to fully appreciate, surface resolution that rivals injection-molded miniatures.

Requires careful exposure calibration and a well-tuned printer to get the best from it — this is not a forgiving beginner resin, but in the hands of an experienced operator with a calibrated setup, the results justify the attention it demands.

Best for: High-resolution printers (8K+), competition miniatures, jewellery-quality display pieces, any application where absolute maximum detail is the goal.

The Bottom Line: There Is No Best Resin

There's only the best resin for what you're making.

Standard for high-volume decorative printing. ABS-like for anything that will be handled. Engineering for functional stress. Flexible for parts that need to move. Castable for metalwork. Dental for clinical applications. Water washable for simplicity and shared spaces. High-detail for miniatures where every micron of surface quality matters.

The mistake that costs most resin printers time, money, and failed prints is using whatever resin they bought first for every application. The second tube of resin you buy should be chosen for a specific purpose — and the difference in results between a matched resin-application pairing and a mismatched one is not subtle.

The market in 2026 has given us an extraordinary range of materials. Use the range.

Quick Reference: Top Resins of 2026 at a Glance

Disagree with a pick? Have a resin that outperformed your expectations this year? Tell us in the comments — community testing across thousands of printers and applications catches things no single review can. And if this guide helped you narrow down the choice for your next project, share it with someone still staring at the resin aisle trying to decide.