Choosing the Best 3D Printer Under $500 // Comparison Guide

When I first got started 3D printing, I remembered the “entry level” 3D printer was $2,500, made out of lasercut plywood, and its 3D prints that it could produce were limited and “okay” at best. Times have changed, because now you can get some excellent 3D printers for less than $500, and they’re made of mass-produced, quality components with print quality that would blow those old prints out of the water. There’s a lot of variance between 3D printers in the sub $500 price range, so let’s take a look at what makes each one tick and where it might best serve you.

Let's jump in-

BCN3D Printers at a Glance

• Ender 3
• Affordable, reliable, and endlessly moddable.
• Anycubic Photon Mono 2K
• The easiest entry into the resin 3D printing workspace, and fast printing as well.
• BIQU B1
• Fully-featured right out of the box yet doesn’t even come close to the $500 threshold.
• CR-20
• A slightly more compact variant of the Ender 3 design
• Ender 5 Pro
  • With a bed that moves in Z, prints are kept stable throughout the printing process, and several quality of life features keep things running smoothly.
• Anycubic Photon Mono SE
  • The only Anycubic resin 3D printer with built in filtration and a compact footprint.
• CR-20 Pro
  • An improved CR-20 with extras like bed leveling and a magnetic, removable build plate.
• CR-10S
  • The largest 3D printer on the list with a 300mm x 300mm x 400mm build volume.
• Phrozen Sonic Mini 4K
  • The highest resolution on one of the smallest resin 3D printers we offer.
• Ender 3 Pro Maker Bundle
  • Some adjustments to the Ender 3 design to improve reliability and consistency, packaged with some awesome upgrades.
• Ender 3 V2 Maker Bundle
  • All the lessons learned of past Creality printers rolled into one new printer, and bundled with some worthwhile upgrades.
• Monoprice Maker Ultimate 2
  • The only enclosed printer on the list - a recommended feature for regular ABS 3D printing.

Ender 3

At this point, the Ender 3 is a classic. For less than $200 you can have a 3D printer with an all-metal, aluminum extrusion frame, injection molded components, and not a single 3D printed structural part in sight. Out of the box, an Ender 3 will perform decently well, but it doesn’t have any sort of features to “wow” you. Instead, its glory comes from being such a low cost printer that means you can upgrade and modify it for the features you desire most, rather than pay for them and not use them. Need to print with higher temperature materials? Ditch the PTFE-lined hotend and try out a MicroSwiss all-metal hotend. Want to be able to easily remove your 3D prints and leave sharp spatulas behind? Slap on a Buildtak Flexplate System so you can pop prints off as soon as they are finished and get right back to printing. Really, the possibilities are endless, especially since its low cost means there is a huge community of Ender 3 modders creating their own designs to incorporate any combination of parts to fit the Ender 3. If you know you already want an all-metal hotend and flexible build sheet, checkout the Ender 3 Maker Bundle that comes with these upgrades packed together and ready for you to install.

Anycubic Photon Mono 2K

It wasn’t long ago that resin 3D printing was an expensive process reserved for enterprise level 3D printer users. Anycubic really changed the face of resin 3D printing with the introduction of the Anycubic Photon several years ago; it was small, affordable, and just as capable as the big players in the game. One of their latest 3D printers, the Anycubic Photon Mono 2K improves on the Photon platform with a monochromatic LCD a divergence from the standard RGB LCDs of previous models. The LCD is what allows the UV light to pass through into the resin vat and cure it into the shape of each layer, and by using a monochromatic screen layer cure times are often ten times quicker than RGB; they allow even more light to pass through for faster curing. Pair the Anycubic Photon Mono with epoxy-free MH Build Series resin and you can have this small companion fit right on your desk without worrying about any resin odors.

Big Tree Tech BIQU B1

Big Tree Tech has been known for their components, from motherboards to extruders to touchscreens, so it’s no surprise they have the know-how to create their own 3D printer. The BIQU B1 takes a lot of design cues from other aluminum-extrusion 3D printers, but flips it on its head by improving on the functionality using their own hardware. The screen at the front isn’t just full color - it’s a touchscreen! And if you so choose you can turn it back to the interface you might be used to by holding down the knob. Dual radial fans and a unique, clear duct better directs air toward your hot 3D print and illuminates in with the built-in LED. Even the motherboard improves the design with nearly silent stepper drivers, so the loudest thing on this printer really is just the fans. To top it all off, the stock build plate is a flexible and textured “Super Steel Sheet” that makes 3D prints basically fall off the bed once it’s cooled but maintains a rocksteady grip throughout the print. The Big Tree Tech BIQU B1 has a lot of bells and whistles that will really make this a 3D printer to reckon with.

CR-20

For those that want an Ender 3-like 3D printer but don’t want to spend the time assembling a pile of parts, the Creality CR-20 is essentially a flat-packed Ender 3. Rather than several components that need to be bolted together, the CR-20 is essentially just two separate parts out of the box: the base and the gantry. With only a handful of bolts you can have this printer assembled and ready to go. From there, its design is very similar to the Ender 3, so many of the mods and upgrades will be just as compatible with this model, perfect for growing with your skills and needs.

Ender 5 Pro

This is one of only a few 3D printers on our list that uses what is called a “cantilever” style bed. Rather than moving the bed along the Y axis, instead it is gradually lowered on the Z axis. By using this method, your 3D prints are a lot more stable than flinging the bed back and forth, so tall 3D prints are much less likely to tip over as the print progresses. Besides that, the Ender 5 Pro has a lot of beneficial features: an all-metal extruder is much more durable than the standard plastic extruders of other Creality machines, a premium Capricorn XS bowden tube to more tightly constrain filament, and a magnetic and flexible build plate to quickly remove your finished prints and start the next.

Anycubic Photon Mono SE

In terms of what you can print, the Anycubic Photon Mono 2K and Photon Mono SE are essentially identical; they have the same build volume, monochrome LCD screen, and sturdy metal frame. However, several quality of life features will give you more control of your resin 3D printing process. The top hinges away from the printer on the Mono SE so you don’t have to worry about finding a spot to put the lid while you’re working on the build plate or adding resin. This is the only Photon Mono that features any sort of filtration by using two small interior fans to push air through a filter and remove any sort of stinky odor that’s common with 3D printing resin (unless of course you are using epoxy-free MH Build resin). For a workspace where you expect to use some of the more odorous resins, the Anycubic Photon Mono SE will be the better resin 3D printer choice you could make.

CR-20 Pro

Just like the Creality CR-20, the CR-20 Pro comes flat packed, so just a couple screws and you’re up and running. The big difference is this model already has some worthwhile upgrades like a flexible build plate, bed leveling sensor, and a bowden tube that more tightly constrains the filament path. The addition of a removable, magnetic build plate means you can flex it and peel your finished 3D prints off the bed rather than use a sharp scraper and risk damaging your machine or yourself. The genuine BL-Touch bed leveling sensor takes the guesswork out of calibrating the level of your bed and more precisely control how close your first layer is, and it’s material agnostic. That means you can upgrade your build plate, change it out, or try the LayerLock Powdercoated beds and the BL-Touch will have no problem detecting the bed surface and creating a reliable map of your CR-20’s bed. Capricorn XS tubing replaces the generic bowden tube and brings the internal diameter to a tiny 1.9mm so that extrusions and retractions are more directly reflected and backlash is minimized. Overall this is a great machine out of the box for newcomers to find their footing with 3D printing.

CR-10S

The printer that started it all. The Creality CR-10S exploded the popularity of Creality and 3D printers alike; it was affordable, it was sturdy, and it was huge. Years on and this is still a 3D printer that can hold its own with a 300mm x 300mm x 400mm build volume (and yes, that’s for less than $500). The all-aluminum frame comes mostly assembled out of the box, with several screws and support brackets tying together the two main pieces that come in the box. The “S'' in the name signifies some improvements over the original CR-10, as well; a filament runout sensor to detect when your massive print jobs are about to run out of material (and pauses it), dual Z-axis lead screws support the X-axis gantry from both sides, ensuring there isn’t any lean or drag in the Z axis motion, and a print recovery function that will attempt to pick up where you left off if a power failure interrupts your 3D print.

Phrozen Sonic Mini 4K

The Phrozen Sonic Mini 4K is a special model within this small, desktop resin 3D printer niche. Where most others use a 2K LCD screen, which directly translates to the resolution of your 3D prints, this 3D printer has a full 4K LCD - and it’s monochrome! So you can print fast and super fine with the Sonic Mini 4K right on your desk and use epoxy-free MH Build resin to keep down any odors.

Ender 3 Pro Maker Bundle

While very similar to the Ender 3 and Ender 3 maker bundle, the differences can be subtle if you don’t know what to look for. The aluminum extrusion that guides the Y-axis carriage has been beefed up to a 40mm x 40mm extrusion, rather than the slimmer 20mm x 40mm extrusion of the Ender 3. This has been done in an aim to keep the build plate at a consistent level and not need to be releveled as often. Meanwell is known for making reliable electronics and power supplies in particular, which is why the Ender 3 Pro uses a genuine Meanwell power supply which should improve the robustness of this 3D printer's electronics for a long long time.

Ender 3 V2 Maker Bundle

Many changes have been made to the Ender 3 in years past, culminating in the Ender 3 V2. Features that would normally be 3D printed upgrades designed by 3D printing community members are now injection molded parts included from the very start; a knob on the extruder makes jogging material easy, and knobs on the X and Y axis idler mean you can fine tune belt tension for the smoothest ride. The base of the printer has had a bit of a redesign with the power supply being moved underneath the Y axis carriage and handy parts drawer integrated into the frame to keep all your tools closeby. Though the biggest thing you’ll notice off the bat is the full-color screen to make navigation through the different options and settings easy and intuitive. And of course, by making this into a bundle, you get even more features out of the Ender 3 V2, like an all-metal hotend for high-temperature 3D printing and a flexible Buildtak Flexplate System so you can quickly go from one job to the next.

Monoprice Maker Ultimate 2

The Monoprice Maker Ultimate 2 is a fully enclosed 3D printer and has the capabilities to bring its bed to 100°C, which makes it a perfect fit for printing with ABS. With a glass bed and an automatic bed leveling sensor, you can print with a wide variety of materials with confidence that, with the right adhesive solution, anything will stick to the glass; it’s the perfect baseline for any 3D printer bed. A filament runout sensor will detect if you’re out of filament before the job is done, pause the job, and wait off to the side until you can change out the material and resume. Among all the printers on the list, this is the only one that comes enclosed, so if you know you need to do a lot of ABS 3D printing, this is the one for you.

There are many 3D printers in the under $500 price range, which can make it difficult to sift through them and find the right model for yourself. Hopefully you have a much better understanding of the differences between each 3D printer and have the information that you need to choose the right one for you. If you enjoyed this video, be sure to subscribe to the MatterHackers Youtube channel and find us @MatterHackers on all your favorite social media platforms. To learn more and order your own inexpensive 3D printer today, go to MatterHackers.com.