Most 3D printer users haven’t used 3D printing yet
3DP War Journal #95
The 3D printing market still has a long way to go. A few months ago, in an interview with Nicolas Mathian from Sculpteo, I said that if I had to rate the maturity of the 3D printing market today on a scale from 1 to 10, I would say it’s still below 5.
This isn’t a deep market analysis - more of a gut feeling. But even when flipping through reports from most reputable market research firms, one thing remains constant: we’re only at the beginning of something much bigger.
The market is growing and will continue to grow.
Take the desktop FFF 3D printer market. Between the third and fourth quarters of last year, something breakthrough happened. There was an unprecedented surge in demand, resulting in record sales.
The market has crossed a threshold. 3D printers are no longer being purchased exclusively by hobbyists, makers, designers, or semi- and fully professional users. They are now being bought by ordinary people - for fun, experimentation, or simply the desire to own one.
For years, consumer 3D printing belonged to a specific type of user: the enthusiast, the tinkerer, the kind of person willing to read technical documentation and spend a weekend calibrating hardware. In certain cases, even pick up a soldering iron - something most people don’t own and are reluctant to use.
The maker movement carried this market on its shoulders and did so effectively - but it also defined its natural limits. Growth was only possible where DIY culture could reach.
Today, the market is driven by people who have never heard of the maker movement, have no idea what G-code is, and have no intention of learning. They buy a 3D printer the same way they buy a coffee machine or a kitchen appliance.
They want the result, not the process.
The best comparison for what’s happening is the Thermomix. This German cooking device has dominated European kitchens for years not because it turned users into chefs, but because it removed the need to be one.
All you need is an app, a recipe, a few clicks, and the right ingredients. You follow instructions - add food in the right order, maybe finish it in the oven or on a pan - and the rest happens automatically.
The quality of meals produced is out of reach for someone with basic cooking skills without this kind of technological support.
Suddenly, everyone becomes a cook. Suddenly, we can create at home dishes that previously could only be ordered in restaurants (obviously whether they match restaurant quality depends on the restaurants we compare them to).
The exact same mechanism is starting to work in 3D printing.
App ecosystems and model platforms have matured to the point where the user doesn’t need to make any technical decisions.
The model is optimized for specific hardware, supports are generated automatically, print settings are preconfigured by the manufacturer, and filament colors are assigned to specific parts. You just load the material and press a button. The printer does the rest.
This leads to the question: what caused this transition? How did 3D printers start reaching ordinary people?
The key shift was moving from “we make 3D printers” to “we make consumer electronics in the form of 3D printers.”
This isn’t just semantics - it’s a deep, fundamental change in approach.
Historically, 3D printing is an industrial technology, created as an alternative to prototyping. It proved so effective that it eventually dominated prototyping entirely, becoming the default manufacturing method in that space.
Over time, it expanded into more advanced applications: production of specialized end-use parts, hearing aids, medical implants, surgical and dental tools.
But regardless of its evolution - technological or application-based - one thing remained unchanged: it was an industrial technology. And industrial technologies are used by trained professionals.
And if specialists use it, you can expect more from them. Which means expecting less from yourself.
For years, both expensive professional AM systems and cheaper, theoretically consumer-grade 3D printers were difficult and demanding because their creators assumed users would invest time to figure them out.
Not just operation - almost everything:
configuration
materials
software.
I remember an anecdote from the early Polish market in 2013. One of the first resellers received a DIY 3D printer from what was then a leading Polish manufacturer. When asked why some metal parts didn’t fit because they were too large, the manufacturer replied: “just cut them down; with a hacksaw”.
And that’s how it went for years…
Manufacturers and users accepted an unspoken compromise: we sell you machines that aren’t fully intuitive or operational, and you figure them out yourself, compensating for our shortcomings.
Industrial machines ran on outdated software with UI logic from the 1990s, while amateur devices relied on open-source ecosystems.
This changed in 2022, began becoming a new standard in 2023, and started delivering measurable results in 2025. You know who I’m talking about.
The shift came from a different mindset. A 3D printer was no longer meant to be a 3D printer with all its limitations - it was meant to be a consumer device in the form of a 3D printer.
The new user was supposed to be technologically inexperienced. Someone who had never held an Allen key. Their software knowledge limited to Word and Excel.
How do you onboard such a user into 3D printing? With simplified hardware, highly intuitive software, and a library of ready-to-print 3D models.
And importantly - these are not Thingiverse-style STL files that require manual setup, support generation, and slicing decisions. These are 3MF files where everything is preconfigured, with optional editing for advanced users.
Everything is simple, easy, and enjoyable - as much as the fundamentals of FFF technology allow. Some things can’t be simplified to the level of a kitchen appliance. But compared to likes of XYZPrinting, Robo3D, or Micro, which 10 years ago were promising similar outcomes - we are in a completely different place today.
The consequences are significant. A market that grew alongside a niche community suddenly gained access to an entirely different scale.
Hundreds of millions of people who never identified with maker culture are becoming potential users of 3D printers.
Not because they learned something new - but because the technology no longer requires them to.
This doesn’t mean the market is mature though...
Quite the opposite. What we are seeing now is just the beginning of a new growth curve.
Ecosystem infrastructure, model libraries, e-commerce integration, on-demand personalization, print-to-home services - all of these elements are still taking shape.
Most future 3D printer users haven’t even encountered the technology yet.