PLA vs PETG vs ABS: Choosing a Filament

The three most common 3D printing materials solve different problems. Here's how we help customers pick, in plain English.

Every day someone uploads a part and asks us the same question: "which material should I pick?" For most parts the answer is one of three filaments — and picking between them is easier than the internet makes it sound.

PLA: the default for a reason

PLA is stiff, prints beautifully, and holds fine detail better than the other two. If your part lives indoors at room temperature — brackets, organizers, prototypes, models, jigs — PLA is almost always the right first answer, and it's the most affordable option on our quote page.

Skip it when: the part will sit in a hot car, outdoors in the sun, or under sustained load. PLA starts to soften around 55 °C and slowly deforms (creeps) under constant stress.

PETG: the outdoor and workhorse pick

PETG takes what PLA can't: heat into the 70s °C, UV exposure, moisture, and a bit of flex before it breaks instead of snapping. Garden fixtures, car interior parts, brackets that get torqued down, anything that touches water — PETG.

The trade-off: slightly softer details and a glossier surface than PLA. Strings a little more, which finishing takes care of.

ABS / ASA: the engineering choice

ABS (and its UV-stable sibling ASA) handles the most heat of the three and machines, sands, and vapor-smooths beautifully. It's the pick for enclosures around electronics that warm up, automotive parts, and anything you want to post-process to a molded-plastic finish. ASA in particular is the best answer for parts that live outside year-round.

The trade-off: ABS wants a heated chamber to print reliably at size — which is exactly why it's priced against the machines in our fleet that have one.

The 10-second decision

Indoors, cosmetic, or prototype → PLA
Outdoors, wet, warm, or load-bearing → PETG
Hot, post-processed, or engineering-grade → ABS/ASA

Still unsure? Upload your part and try all three — the price updates instantly when you switch materials, and the difference is usually smaller than you'd expect. Or ask us and tell us what the part needs to survive; we quote materials against the actual machine that will print them, so you get the real numbers either way.