First up is Reddit: the ultimate forum for all things, which of course includes 3D printing! Reddit’s main 3D printing community, or subreddit, is “r/3Dprinting“, but you can also find many printer-specific subreddits, such as “r/Ender3“.

r/3Dprinting has over 812,000 users, and at least a few thousand are online at any given moment. A few popular topics include functional 3D prints, outrageously well-printed 3DBenchies, sales for 3D printing products, and of course, 3D printing problems.

Reddit is a great option for a help website because it has a clean and easy-to-use interface with a great upvote system that brings popular questions or topics to the forefront. You can easily post a problem or question on Reddit and add an image so that others better understand the situation.

While many older Reddit posts are archived and don’t allow you to reply to them, you can still look at the post and comments to find help. To find previous posts, you can use the search tool, although it may not work if your search isn’t precisely worded.

Once posted, users can respond to your post with comments and you can reply back if you have follow-up questions. The comments section is where most help is provided, so make sure you keep an eye on it. On these Reddit forums, most information tends to be true, useful, and relevant, and posts that break the subreddit’s rules are usually removed by moderators.

• User base or forum size: Over 812,000 members
• Activity: Very active, with quick response times (usually within days)
• Popular topics: Print quality issues, upgrades, machine options, popular projects

You probably know Thingiverse as the super-popular 3D model repository started by MakerBot, but Thingiverse also has a forum and groups that offer 3D printing-related help. Just know that the site can sometimes be pretty glitchy, and its forum pages are pretty simplistic.

The most popular group is “Engineering“, followed by the “Creality Ender 3” and “Prusa i3” groups. The latter two are printer-specific forums, but they still contain a lot of useful information. These two groups have over 19,500 and 14,700 users, respectively, covering over 4,000 topics combined.

The topics proposed in these forums range from print quality issues and fixing nozzle clogs to product shipping issues and print modifications. If you have a 3D printer that’s moderately popular in the 3D printing community, chances are there’s a Thingiverse group for it.

In Thingiverse groups, you can ask questions as topics or post 3D models, like upgrades, for your specific 3D printer. Users answer questions by replying to your post and you can use the follow button to get notifications when a certain topic receives more comments or replies. This can be super helpful if you have a non-urgent problem or simply want to pick up useful information over time.

You can use the search tool inside a Thingiverse group to find posts and other information relevant to your search. Much of the information on Thingiverse is reliable, and users can flag posts to report them.

• User base or forum size: Over 23,000 users and 4,000 topics
• Activity: Fairly active
• Popular topics: Print quality issues, product shipping, machine modifications

Go Further

Thingiverse

The PrusaPrinters forum was started by Prusa Research, the makers of the Prusa i3 MK3S and Prusa Mini, to allow Prusa users to get help for their machines. PrusaPrinters, like Thingiverse, is also a 3D model repository, but the platform is still up-and-coming and isn’t yet the most popular. Nevertheless, the site has a mostly clean interface that makes finding problems quite easy because of the site’s categorization and organization.

The forum portion of PrusaPrinters allows you to post questions, and there are over 176,000 current users who have created over 41,000 topics. Typical topics include assembling printers, tuning slicer settings, adding modifications like OctoPrint, or general Prusa announcements.

While PrusaPrinters is really only meant for Prusa printers (hence the name), the platform contains information relevant to 3D printing in general, like knowing which settings can improve various aspects of your prints. Generally, there isn’t a lot of false information on PrusaPrinters, and users have trust ratings and awards.

On the site, you can find topics based on the Prusa device they’re meant for (e.g. Prusa Mini or Prusa i3 MK3S), or you can use the search tool to find similar older posts. When you post a topic with a description and an (optional) image, users can reply to your initial question to help you find the answer.

• User base or forum size: Over 176,000 users and 41,000 topics
• Activity: Very active
• Popular topics: Company machines, company announcements, tuning slicer settings, upgrades

Facebook is the largest online community in the world, and its Facebook Groups are an excellent platform for 3D printing help. Three of the most popular groups include “3D Printing STLs“, “3D Printing for Noobs“, and the “Creality Ender 3 Group“. Facebook Groups has been around for a while, and its interface is pretty easy to use, so getting help shouldn’t be a problem.

The 3D Printing STLs, 3D Printing for Noobs, and Creality Ender 3 groups have over 121,000, 68,000, and 82,000 members, respectively. All three are great for getting community feedback and help, but the first option is best for finding 3D models to print, while the other two are more focused on solving problems.

You can post your questions and topics in these groups and wait for others to reply, but all three groups have a high post-per-day volume, so you may not get an immediate answer. Facebook Groups, like the Creality-run Ender 3 Group are also great places to find giveaways and 3D printable upgrades.

Many of the Facebook groups for 3D printing are restricted, and your Facebook account has to be approved for you to post or view other posts. This limits the number of bots, spammers, and scammers from infiltrating Facebook Groups. That said, there aren’t any merit requirements to get in, so you should only have to wait a short time to be approved.

Most of the information on these forums is accurate, and users can report comments and posts if they’re out of line with the group’s rules. There’s also a search feature within the groups that allows you to find members or posts relevant to your search.

• User base or forum size: Over 121,000 users
• Activity: Fairly active
• Popular topics: 3D printable models, print quality issues, upgrades, giveaways

Next up is YouTube, Google’s massive online video platform. With over 2 billion users and more than a billion hours of video watched each day, you can almost surely find what you’re looking for. Although YouTube might not be considered as community-based as other platforms, many 3D printing content creators love to answer questions in their videos, making it a great platform for assistance. YouTube’s interface to chat with video creators may not be the most advanced, but it works well enough.

While it’s difficult to tell how many 3D printing users are on YouTube, it’s probably safe to assume that the topic has at least a few hundred thousand viewers, just based on view counts and comments. Needless to say, there’s a lot of relevant 3D printing information, and many videos are about installing upgrades, reviewing printers, and fixing quality issues. There are also many prominent 3D printing YouTubers, like TeachingTech, 3D Printing Nerd, and Maker’s Muse.

To get help, you can ask a question in the comments, and they might respond to you. Other (non-creator) users can also respond, making YouTube a community platform as well as a video hosting site. Unfortunately, it can be difficult to find older comments without looking at every single one, but it should be easy to find other videos using YouTube’s search function.

A typical interaction might involve a user commenting on a content creator’s video and receiving replies from the creator and other users. A new video might even be made to specifically address the issue. The more popular content creators usually post accurate information because, on a video platform, creators typically back up their claims with video, which can provide more information than a simple forum post.

• User base or forum size: Hundreds of thousands
• Activity: Fairly active
• Popular topics: Upgrades, machine fixes, slicer settings

Ultimaker is a popular manufacturer of 3D printers, filament, and even software (i.e. Cura), and the Ultimaker community forum is another great place to get help. This forum may look outdated, but it’s packed with great content and the community is constructive.

There are many different groups on the forum, with two excellent choices being the groups “Third-party products & modifications” and “Improve your 3D prints”. The first group has over 23,300 posts and contains a lot of information about printers. The second group has over 25,700 posts and is meant for finding ways to improve print quality and prevent prints from failing.

You can post questions with a caption and picture, and other users can see them and respond. Even if you’re not responding, as is the case with many forums, just reading the comments section for a similar problem is an effective way to solve your own without posting and waiting for replies. To find previous posts or past information, you can use the search tool, which will bring up similarly-worded posts.

• User base or forum size: Over 230,000 posts
• Activity: Fairly active
• Popular topics: Print quality issues, mechanical problems

The RepRap project started in the early 2000s and had a huge impact on the existing and accessibility of consumer 3D printers. The RepRap forum is an online community based around the RepRap project, and while it could definitely use an update to improve its look, tons of information can be found inside. There are many different subject areas inside the forum, but the “General” or “Printing” categories are good places to start.

The General RepRap forum page has over 114,000 posts with 12,700 topics, which is more than the 26,000 posts and over 4,000 topics in the Printing category. Some topics include heat sink pastes for hot ends, problems with hardware, improving surface quality, and more.

To ask a question on the RepRap forum, you have to be logged in and click “New Topic” in whichever forum group you want to direct your question to. Like other platforms, people can help you out by replying to your post. This is where a majority of old (but useful) information can be found. You can find this information and older posts by using the search tool, which works but can be slow and yield many irrelevant topics.

• User base or forum size: Over 526,000 posts
• Activity: Fairly active
• Popular topics: Hot ends, hardware problems, print quality issues

SoliForum is the official forum for Solidoodle-brand printers, a mostly failed 3D printer company that closed down a few years ago. Despite this, SoliForum is still a great place for information. Many people continue to use the platform and can help you with your machine.

Inside SoliForum, like some of the other platforms, there are groups. The “3D Printer Discussion” and the “General Discussion” groups are great places to ask any questions you might have, having over 8,000 and 2,700 posts, respectively. While topics vary a lot (especially in the General Discussion group), many are centered around quality issues, printer considerations (i.e. which to buy), and electronics questions.

To ask a question on SoliForum, you can post a new topic to a specific group, but you can also help others by navigating to posts labeled as active or unanswered. You can use SoliForum’s advanced search tools to narrow in on what you actually want to find.

Unfortunately, you can’t search for specific posts in SoliForum, so you may have to learn as you browse the topics. However, there is a Discord chat for the Soliforum, which is very nice. Note that the forum is older than the others and mostly un-monitored by mods or administrators, so you should be cautious about false information or scam downloads.

• User base or forum size: Over 8,000 posts
• Activity: Somewhat active
• Popular topics: Print quality issues, machine options, electronics questions

Hubs is a distributed manufacturing website that connects consumers with producers to get special or unique parts manufactured. The Hubs forum (“talk”) has over 14,000 topics, ranging from 3D printing, CNC machining, injection molding, popular maker projects, and many others.

Hubs has a few different categories, which may be based on the technology or generic topic information. The 3D printing category is the largest, followed by the CAD category (not including the “no category” topics). After creating an account, you can ask questions on the Hubs forum and other users can reply to the topic to help you out.

While many posts are outdated, they still contain useful information, especially regarding universal problems like under-extrusion. You can use the search tool on Hubs Talk to find related topics, which seem to work pretty well.

• User base or forum size: Over 14,000 topics
• Activity: Somewhat active
• Popular topics: Printing issues, CAD software, 3D scanning, CNC machining

LinkedIn is a well-known social media site focused on business and, like Facebook, they have their own groups. The LinkedIn 3D Printing Today group is the most popular 3D printing group on LinkedIn, with more than 69,000 members. This group has fewer posts on troubleshooting topics, focusing instead on the benefits and uses of 3D printing.

You can start a “conversation” in a LinkedIn group, and then others can comment on and like your post. To find older information or posts, you can use LinkedIn’s search tool to search within a certain group or the entire LinkedIn platform.

Most of the information is news-related and there’s a reporting feature that can be useful for removing false posts. Also, access to this group is restricted, and you have to be approved. This keeps bots and scammers away.

• User base or forum size: Over 69,000 members
• Activity: Somewhat active
• Popular topics: Uses of 3D printing, benefits of 3D printing

Lastly, Quora is a social media platform meant for helping people learn, ask questions, and share stories. The “3D Printing” group is over 85,500 users strong and includes many 3D printing concept questions and information related to additive manufacturing’s functionality and capabilities.

As you might expect from its name, most posts on Quora are questions, so don’t expect many posts sharing popular or successful 3D prints. You can ask questions by clicking the “Add question” button, letting other users comment or answer your question in the replies area. Upvotes determine the popularity of a reply, and replies with more upvotes are shown to more users.

If you want to answer a question, you can head to the “Answer” section in a group, such as the 3D Printing group, and then choose a question to reply to. Most information on Quora is accurate and there’s a reporting tool and downvote feature, which limits the popularity of false replies and questions.

To find older posts and information, you can use the generic search feature on Quora. Unfortunately, this searches the entire Quora site, not just a specific group, so it may be hard to narrow or filter your search results.

• User base or forum size: Over 85,000 followers
• Activity: Fairly active
• Popular topics: Concept questions, machine options