Quick compare
Sorted roughly easiest → hardest to print. Use this to shortlist, then read the full entry below before committing a spool.
| Material | Difficulty | Strength | Heat resist. | Flex | UV / outdoor | Enclosure |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PLA | Easy | Low–med | Poor (~55°C) | Rigid | Degrades | No |
| PETG | Easy–med | Med–high | Med (~70°C) | Slight give | Fair | No |
| TPU | Medium | Med (tear-resist.) | Med (~60°C) | Very flexible | Fair | No |
| ABS | Med–hard | High | Good (~95°C) | Rigid, tough | Poor | Yes |
| ASA | Med–hard | High | Good (~95°C) | Rigid, tough | Excellent | Yes |
| Nylon | Hard | Very high | Good (~80–120°C) | Tough, springy | Fair | Yes |
| PC | Hard | Very high | Excellent (~110–140°C) | Rigid, tough | Fair | Yes |
| PVA | Medium | n/a (support) | Poor | Rigid | n/a | No |
I want to make X → use Y
The fastest lookup in this doc. For the reasoning behind each pick, see the full write-ups below.
| I want to make… | Use… |
|---|---|
| Miniatures / display models | PLA |
| Cosplay props / armor | PLA (ABS if vapor-smoothing) |
| Quick prototype / fit-check part | PLA |
| First print on a new printer | PLA |
| Electronics enclosure (indoor) | PETG |
| Tool holder / jig / fixture | PETG |
| Kitchen utensil holder (dry goods only) | PETG |
| Snap-fit clip or latch | PETG (Nylon for heavy use) |
| Garden planter / short-term outdoor part | PETG |
| Signage, mailbox parts, permanent outdoor mount | ASA |
| Automotive interior / under-hood-adjacent part | ABS |
| Housing near a heat source or motor | ABS or PC |
| Clear, high-heat lens or cover | PC (clear grade) |
| Phone case / protective bumper | TPU |
| Cable grommet / vibration damper | TPU |
| Wearable strap | TPU |
| RC tires / bumpers | TPU |
| Gears, hinges, drone frame | Nylon (PA / PA-CF) |
| Load-bearing bracket, repeated stress cycles | Nylon |
| Complex overhangs / cavities in one print | PVA or HIPS support |
PLA (Polylactic Acid)
baseline materialThe default. Made from cornstarch or sugarcane, low-odor, barely warps, and forgiving of a mediocre setup. The ceiling on mechanical performance and heat resistance is the trade-off for how easy it is.
- Prints clean, crisp detail with minimal tuning
- No enclosure, no fumes, safe in shared/living spaces
- Cheap, wide color and specialty-finish selection
- Softens well below 60°C — a hot car will warp it
- Brittle under sudden load or repeated flexing
- Not UV or weather stable long-term
Miniatures, display models, prototypes you're iterating on fast, brackets and jigs that never see heat or impact, cosplay props, anything decorative. PLA+/ silk/matte variants swap a little ease-of-print for slightly better toughness or looks.
PETG (Glycol-modified PET)
go-to functional partThe step up from PLA that most people reach for once a part actually has to do something. Tougher, handles mild heat, and shrugs off moisture and mild chemicals — but it strings more and is harder to sand or glue cleanly.
- Good layer adhesion and impact resistance
- Handles outdoor damp and mild chemical exposure
- Food-contact safe when printed with a dedicated nozzle*
- Stringy — retraction tuning matters
- Soft enough to scratch and to ooze on overhangs
- Absorbs moisture fast; dry it before long prints
Enclosures, brackets, outdoor planters, tool holders, anything that gets handled or lightly stressed, kitchen and garage parts. A solid all-round "print it and trust it" material.
ABS (Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene)
tough, needs an enclosureSame plastic as most injection-molded consumer parts (think Lego, car interior trim). Tougher and more heat-resistant than PLA/PETG, machinable and acetone-vapor-smoothable — but it warps and delaminates without a controlled chamber, and it smells while printing.
- Higher heat resistance than PLA/PETG
- Machinable, sandable, acetone vapor-polishes to gloss
- Genuinely tough under impact
- Warps and cracks without an enclosed, heated chamber
- Releases styrene fumes — ventilate or filter
- Poor UV resistance; yellows and degrades outdoors
Automotive/interior-adjacent parts, enclosures that see mild heat (near electronics, in a car), parts you plan to vapor-smooth or paint. If the part will live outdoors, use ASA instead — same process, far better UV life.
ASA (Acrylonitrile Styrene Acrylate)
ABS's outdoor siblingChemically close to ABS with the same enclosure and warping requirements, but formulated to resist UV, so it doesn't yellow or go brittle in sunlight. If you're choosing between the two for anything that sees daylight, this is the one.
- Excellent long-term UV and weather stability
- Same toughness and heat resistance as ABS
- Slightly less warping-prone than ABS in practice
- Still needs an enclosed, draft-free chamber
- Fumes — ventilate the same as ABS
- Pricier than ABS for a modest real-world gain indoors
Anything permanently outdoors: mailbox parts, garden fixtures, drone bodies, signage, mounts on a car or patio. Skip it for indoor-only parts where PETG does the job for less hassle.
TPU (Thermoplastic Polyurethane)
the flexible oneA rubber-like flexible filament ranging from firm (95A shore hardness) to genuinely squishy (85A and softer). Prints slow because it's soft enough to buckle in a bowden tube, but a direct-drive extruder handles it fine.
- Genuinely rubber-like flex and rebound
- Excellent abrasion and tear resistance
- Good chemical/oil resistance
- Slow print speed — retraction and speed both need turning down
- Grabs moisture aggressively; degrades print quality fast if wet
- Stringing and elephant's-foot are common failure points
Phone cases, gaskets, cable management/grommets, wheels and tires for RC or robotics, vibration dampers, wearable straps, protective bumpers on other printed parts.
Nylon (PA / PA-CF)
mechanical workhorseThe strongest and most fatigue-resistant common filament, used for gears, hinges, and anything that flexes thousands of times without cracking. Demanding to print well: it absorbs moisture almost instantly and warps badly without an enclosure.
- Outstanding fatigue life — survives repeated flexing/impact
- Low friction; good for gears and living hinges
- CF-filled variants rival some engineering plastics for stiffness
- Absorbs moisture from open air within hours
- Warps aggressively without an enclosure and a bed adhesive
- CF-filled blends require a hardened steel or ruby nozzle
Gears, living hinges, tool handles, drone frames, load-bearing brackets, anything that needs to survive repeated stress cycles rather than one big load.
PC (Polycarbonate)
highest heat & impactThe top of the common-filament ladder for heat resistance and impact strength — the same family of plastic used for safety glasses and machine guards. Needs the hottest nozzle and bed of anything on this page, plus a sealed, heated chamber.
- Highest heat deflection temperature of the common filaments
- Very high impact strength, resists shattering
- Optically clear grades exist for lenses/covers
- Needs the hottest hotend and chamber temps here — not every printer can reach it
- Brittle if underheated; layer splitting is common on cool printers
- Expensive relative to PETG/ABS
Functional prototypes standing in for injection-molded parts, housings near heat sources, impact-resistant covers, parts that must hold shape at temperatures ABS would sag at.
PVA & HIPS (support materials)
dissolvable supportsNot structural materials — these exist to hold up overhangs on a second extruder/AMS slot, then disappear. PVA dissolves in plain water and pairs with PLA/PETG; HIPS dissolves in limonene and pairs with ABS since it shares a similar print temperature.
Complex overhangs, internal cavities, and multi-part assemblies printed in one go on a dual-extruder or AMS-equipped printer — pick the support material that matches the print temperature of your main filament (PVA with PLA/PETG, HIPS with ABS).
Pick by what the part has to do
When you're not sure which material fits, start from the job, not the filament.
PLA
Best detail and surface finish for the least effort. Miniatures, models, display pieces.
PETG
Tougher than PLA, still no enclosure needed. The default for "will this actually hold up" parts.
ASA
UV-stable where ABS and PLA both fail. Use PETG only if it's brief/incidental exposure.
ABS or PC
PLA/PETG will sag. Go PC if you also need high impact strength or the temps exceed ~95°C.
TPU
Gaskets, cases, dampers — anything that needs to compress or bend and spring back.
Nylon (PA / PA-CF)
Best fatigue resistance of the group. Worth the moisture-management hassle for moving parts.
PVA or HIPS support
On a dual-extruder or AMS setup, print supports in a dissolvable material instead of snapping them off by hand.
PC (clear grade)
Holds optical clarity and shape at temperatures that would fog or sag a PETG or acrylic equivalent.
General good-to-know
Stuff that applies regardless of which filament is loaded — the habits that separate a clean print from a failed one.
Keep it sealed
PETG, TPU, Nylon, and PVA pull moisture from the air within hours to days. Wet filament pops, strings, and surfaces rough. Store spools in sealed bins or bags with silica desiccant, and use a filament dryer or dehydrator before printing anything that's been open a while.
Clean + level first
Most failed prints trace back to the first layer. Wipe the bed with IPA between prints (skin oils kill adhesion), relevel regularly, and use a glue stick or hairspray on stubborn materials like ABS/ASA/Nylon.
Retraction + drier filament
Fine web-like strings between parts are almost always retraction distance/speed, nozzle temp running a touch hot, or moisture in the filament — check the last one before re-tuning settings.
Depends on the material
PLA and TPU want strong cooling for crisp overhangs and bridges. ABS, ASA, Nylon, and PC want little to none — aggressive cooling causes layer splitting (delamination) in those materials by cooling layers unevenly.
Match nozzle to material
Standard brass nozzles are fine for PLA/PETG/ABS/TPU. Anything with carbon fiber, glass fiber, wood, or metal particles is abrasive and will erode a brass nozzle's orifice within a spool or two — use hardened steel or a ruby-tipped nozzle for those.
Don't skip it
ABS, ASA, Nylon, and PC release fumes (styrene and others) that are worth not breathing for hours at a time. Print in a ventilated space, vent an enclosure outside, or run a carbon/HEPA filter. PLA and PETG are lower-odor but still benefit from airflow.
Detail vs. speed
Smaller layer heights (0.1–0.16mm) give finer detail and slightly better layer adhesion/strength, at roughly double the print time of a 0.2–0.28mm layer. Save fine layers for visible or precision parts; go coarser for brackets and prototypes.
Walls matter more
For most functional parts, adding wall/perimeter count (3–5 instead of 2) improves real-world strength more than cranking infill percentage. Infill mostly matters for compression resistance and top/bottom surface support.
Load along the layers, not across them
FDM parts are always weakest between layers (the Z-axis bond), regardless of material. Orient a part so the force it will experience runs parallel to the layer lines, not perpendicular through them, whenever the geometry allows it.
Run a quick calibration print
Different brands of the "same" material can need different temps. A temperature tower or a simple retraction test print takes a few minutes and saves guessing on a full-size print.
Treat it like any heater
A hotend and heated bed are both heating elements running for hours unsupervised. Print on a fireproof, non-flammable surface, keep the area clear of combustibles, and consider a smoke detector nearby if you print long jobs overnight — especially with enclosed, higher-temp materials.
FDM isn't really food-safe
Even with a "food-safe" filament and a nozzle never used for anything else, layer lines harbor bacteria that can't be cleaned out, and most consumer nozzles/tubing use materials not certified for food contact. Treat printed food-adjacent parts as safe for dry goods only, not something that touches food directly or goes in a dishwasher repeatedly.