The prices, they are a changin’. 145% is the current total tariff on goods imported to the U.S. from China, but who knows if that’ll still be the case this time next week. Throughout the course of producing this article the number has changed. Twice.
You may have heard in the news about the chaos this uncertainty causes. We won’t want to add to that noise, but we will break things down to the simple truths, and what you can do to help your situation as a consumer buying and using 3D printing hardware and materials. We warned before to brace yourself; now’s the time for action, or, in some situations, vigilant inaction. There are no magic solutions, just common sense.
A primer first, which, if you’d prefer not to read, you can skip straight to the tips instead. If the ceaseless coverage hasn’t drilled it into your head yet, the tariffs on China mean that anything produced in China, be it Bambu Lab 3D printers, LDO stepper motors, filaments by Polymaker, and everything in between, is subject to a fee of 145% of the goods’ value when it enters the U.S.. This is payable at the border by the importer, not China. The tariffs do not directly extract money from the tariffed country, but make the domestic market conditions unfavorable for using such foreign options.
The tariffs will rarely, directly affect you, the consumer, because you’re not importing containers of goods from China. The places you buy from, though, do, and they will have to pay the fees. And in the hardware space, particularly, where manufacturing eats up the majority of the final cost, these places are unlikely to be able to offset the new fees from their margins.
Ultimately, the costs will be passed along to the consumer. We’ve already seen price rises from brands such as Bambu Lab, which uses a U.S.-based subsidiary to import and warehouse its products locally. Anycubic has communicated that “we’ll be updating our product prices for the U.S. region soon.” Others will follow.
We returned to Kevin Pope, COO at MatterHackers, for his updated take on the situation. He explained, “In the case of current China tariffs, a 25% margin product [such as a 3D printer] might go up a whooping 93.8% to account for the current increase.”
That’s the simple take on goods imported from China. But it also applies to every other country that is tariffed by the U.S. (which is almost all of them, albeit at a lower rate for now). Manufacturers in the U.S. using Chinese-made subassemblies or components — because that’s where the expertise and capacity to produce them are — will also have to pay to receive the components they need to make their goods. The links in the chain become more expensive and, again, the costs will be passed on.
The effects of this extra cost burden will be felt widely in consumer 3D printing. The hardware space is dominated by Chinese companies, namely Creality, Bambu Lab, Elegoo, and Anycubic. And beyond this, many of the components for self-sourced and community-designed 3D printers originate from China, too.
Filaments, for now, may be less exposed than expected. Big names in filament production like eSun and Sunlu make their filament in Vietnam now, but this move was years in the making following the first Trump administration’s use of tariffs on China. “There wasn’t a significant production shift of filament from China to Vietnam until several years after the 2018 China tariffs, when the Biden administration made it clear that those tariffs would not be rolling back,” clarifies Pope, highlighting that the biggest challenge in all this is the uncertainty.
Polymaker, however, manufactures in China and provides white-label services to other brands. According to publicly available data on ImportYeti, one of the top vendors for Polymaker-made filament is Overture, so expect to see price rises there.
Tariff-Busting Tip #1: If You Need It, Buy It Now
Assuming the situation doesn’t change again anytime soon, the best time to buy new hardware and stock up on materials is now. In today’s globalized world, many Chinese brands warehouse their products locally for convenient and cost-effective shipping, and sell through resellers and big-name tech stores like Micro Center. These stocks are finite, and when (and even if) they are replenished, the new goods will be subject to tariffs to enter the country. The knock-on effect of price rises will come later, and is likely to ratchet up as the unknowns in the chain become known and have to be costed in.
“If you’ve had your eye on a 3D printer and that 3D printer is still at or near pre-‘Liberation Day’ pricing, I recommend acting now.” Says Kevin Pope, CCO at 3D printing reseller MatterHackers. “If your wishlist 3D printer has already gone up significantly in price (likely due to China tariffs), taking a ‘wait and see’ approach might be best – don’t pay a premium on uncertainty if you can afford to wait and see where the dust settles in the next few weeks.”
“Everyone in the space is taking a different approach to how reactive they are going to be. We are making price changes on a pretty real-time basis, but this is a function of the fact that we have many, many customer quotes outstanding that we are working to honor pricing on, but uncertainty on how long our physical stocks will hold out.”
Tariff-Busting Tip #2: If You’re Ordering Direct from China, Be Quick About It
The de minimis low-value tax exemption “loophole” will be closed on May 2, meaning anything you buy from the likes of AliExpress, Gearbest, Banggood, or any of the other tech marketplaces that ship directly from China, of a value up to $800, will be subject to duties from that date on.
The fees were initially set at “a duty rate of either 30% of their value or $25 per item,” increasing to $50 per item on June 1. This has since increased following China’s retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods and the U.S. administration’s subsequent response.
At the time of writing, the duty on such low-cost shipments from China will be 90%, or $75 per item, rising to $150 per item on June 1.
So, should you be into home electronics projects and rely on the abundance of components for cents to the dollar, or uber-cheap filament, consider stocking up fast. But only if you know those orders will arrive by May 1 at the latest. Any later and you’ll have to pay up.
Tariff-Busting Tip #3: Buy Filament In Bulk
Many stores in the U.S. offer better rates when you buy in bulk. Despite any price rises that may bump filament prices up in the coming weeks and months, buying in bulk remains the most cost-effective choice per spool.
Off hand, we can already point to the likes of MatterHackers, ProtoPasta, and Atomic Filament as U.S.-based companies offering bulk pricing on their filaments. And even if a company doesn’t flag it on their webstore, wholesale pricing is potentially just a friendly phone call away.
Tariff-Busting Tip #4: Shop Around
As ever with matters of global trade upheaval, the unknowns will only become known as the systems to facilitate the new rules flex and creak, and the exact ways in which they can reliably be enforced bed in. This is particularly true of the low-value packages shipped using the postal system.
Rules of origin should mean that simply shipping the same products from other less-tariffed countries is a no-go; 3D printers, accessories, and materials manufactured in China will be marked as such, and the relevant tariff for China will be collected, no matter where it ships from.
Finding pockets of in-stock hardware at pre-tariff pricing may be tricky, but it could pay to take the time to look. For example, we count 33 authorized resellers for Bambu Lab in the U.S. A few are household names, but the rest are unlikely to show up in the results when you Google for the printers.
Beyond this, you can spend time researching the suppliers of your preferred brands to find where the exposure is. Freight data aggregators like ImportYeti are a (fascinating) place to start to piece together the vast web that makes up modern commerce, and a little time spent there can help you understand which of your preferred stores, if it’s not already clear, are exposed to paying the tariffs.
Tariff-Busting Tip #5: Upgrade/Extend the Life of Older Hardware
Arguably, the best way to print for less right now is to eliminate the need to spend in the first place. Nurture the hardware you have. Who knows how long this situation will persist, and the uncertainty introduced by tit-for-tat measures and temporary pauses, delays, or full-on changes makes it impossible to predict how severely or for how long prices will be affected.
If you’re fortunate enough to own 3D printing hardware, now is the time to tighten up your maintenance and printer care routine. Stock up on the long-term consumables, and become familiar with your manufacturer’s recommended care instructions. Keep the printer clean, lubricated, and in good calibration to keep it operating better for longer.
Tariff-Busting Tip #6: Don’t Be the One to Print It
Something less present in the mind of home 3D printing enthusiasts is to question whether you need to be the one to print it. If you have a critical model and know it is printable and correct, plus the desired material properties, why not ship the job out to a local service?
Not only do you offload the overhead of running your machine, including energy, wear, tear, and material costs, but you open your possibilities to materials and processes you can’t achieve at home.
You lose the deeply satisfying immediacy of seeing the print run, granted. Some services do a better job than others of transparently showing you where and when you can get your models printed, meaning you may not be waiting long. All3DP’s Craftcloud 3D printing marketplace is one such solution.
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License: The text of "How to Keep 3D Printing in the U.S. For Less" by All3DP is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.