Why is cost per gram higher than just the filament price?

Filament is only one of four costs. Electricity to run the printer, depreciation of the machine itself over its rated life, and the cost of failed prints all add real money. This tool sums them so your quotes cover the true cost of goods.

How is machine depreciation calculated?

Depreciation per hour is the printer's purchase price divided by its rated lifetime in hours. Multiplying by the print time gives the wear cost for that job. A 500 unit printer rated for 5000 hours costs 0.10 per print hour.

How does the failure rate change the cost?

Failed prints still consume material, power, and machine time. The tool divides the base cost by (1 minus the failure rate) so that successful prints absorb the cost of the failures. An 8 percent failure rate multiplies cost by about 1.087.

What electricity figures should I use?

Use your printer's average power draw in watts, not its peak heater rating. A typical desktop FDM machine averages 80 to 150 watts. Multiply by hours and divide by 1000 to get kilowatt-hours, then by your per-kWh rate.

Does this include my labour?

No. This is the cost of goods only: material, energy, depreciation, and failures. Add your hourly labour for setup, supervision, and post-processing, plus a profit margin, on top of the figure shown.

What is the 3D Print Total Cost Per Gram?

Calculate the all-in cost per gram of a 3D print by combining filament price, electricity, printer depreciation over its rated lifetime, and a failure rate. A realistic cost basis for quoting print services. Runs in your browser. It runs free in your browser on Gera Tools, with nothing uploaded.

3D Print Total Cost Per Gram

Name: 3D Print Total Cost Per Gram
Creator: Gera Tools
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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Filament price alone badly understates what a 3D print really costs. This calculator adds the three hidden cost drivers — electricity, machine depreciation, and the cost of failed prints — to give an honest, all-in cost per gram you can build a quote on.

How it works

Four costs are combined and then adjusted for failures:

material     = spool price / spool net weight × grams
electricity  = (watts / 1000) × hours × rate per kWh
depreciation = (printer price / rated lifetime hours) × hours
all-in       = (material + electricity + depreciation) / (1 − failure rate)
per gram     = all-in / grams

Dividing by 1 − failure rate spreads the cost of scrapped prints across the ones that succeed, which is the correct way to recover that loss in a price.

Worked example

Consider a 50 g, 5-hour print with these inputs:

Input	Value
Spool price	20 units for 1 kg
Filament used	50 g
Printer wattage	120 W average
Electricity rate	0.25 per kWh
Printer purchase price	500 units
Rated lifetime	5 000 hours
Failure rate	8 %

Material: 20 / 1000 × 50 = 1.00 unit
Electricity: (120 / 1000) × 5 × 0.25 = 0.15 unit
Depreciation: (500 / 5000) × 5 = 0.50 unit
Sub-total: 1.65 unit
After 8 % failures: 1.65 / (1 − 0.08) ≈ 1.79 unit
Per gram: 1.79 / 50 ≈ 0.036 per gram

That is roughly 80 percent more than the bare filament cost of 0.02 per gram — which illustrates why filament-only pricing consistently under-bids print jobs.

What to watch

Failure rate is the single biggest swing factor. Even a modest 10 percent failure rate multiplies your cost by about 1.11. If you run a service bureau, track your actual scrapped-print ratio by material and model complexity rather than guessing.

Electricity rate varies enormously by country and tariff. Use your actual blended rate from a recent bill, not the peak tariff, for an average print session.

Rated lifetime is a manufacturer estimate. A well-maintained, lightly used machine with lubricated rails and replaced wear parts can far outlast the specification; a neglected or heavily used machine may not reach it. Enter a conservative figure if you are using the printer commercially.

Labour is excluded. This figure covers cost of goods only. Add your hourly rate for setup, monitoring, bed preparation, and post-processing on top, then apply your margin before quoting.