What does a 3d printer cost to run?

Run the numbers on your own use

Change any of these and the figures update. The defaults are the typical case described above; your rate is the input that moves the answer most.

Why this is lower than the number you will see elsewhere

Almost every published answer to this question multiplies the rating on the label by the hours the appliance is switched on. For a 3d printer that gives 108 kWh a year, or $20.

The heated bed is the load and it cycles on a thermostat. Nozzle and motors are small by comparison.

The arithmetic, step by step

Nothing here is hidden, so you can check it or change it. Working in the order the formula runs:

1. 120 W — what it draws while it is actually drawing. This is the rating on the plate.
2. × 50% — the share of its in-service time it is really pulling that. The heated bed is the load and it cycles on a thermostat. Nozzle and motors are small by comparison.
   That gives 60 W averaged across the hours it is on.
3. × 6 hours a day × 150 days — Six hours of printing on a printing day.
   60 × 6 × 150 ÷ 1,000 = 54 kWh a year.
4. + standby — 3 W for the other 18.0 hours a day, which is 8.1 kWh a year. People leave this out and it is not always small.
5. × 18.34¢ — the US average residential rate for June 2026.
   62 kWh × 18.34¢ = $11 a year.

Change any assumption in the calculator above and every figure on this page moves with it. The two that matter most are your rate, which varies 4× across the country, and the hours — the duty cycle is a property of the appliance, but the hours are a property of you.

How sensitive is that number?

A single figure invites more confidence than it deserves. Here is the same appliance under assumptions either side of the default, so you can see how much of the answer is the appliance and how much is the guess about how you use it.

Everything else held at the default. The spread here is the honest error bar on the headline figure.

What it costs per hour, day and month

At 18.34¢ per kWh, the US residential average for June 2026.

The thing worth knowing

The heated bed, not the hotend, is nearly all of it, and an enclosure cuts its duty cycle sharply by keeping the heat in. Electricity is usually a smaller share of the cost of a print than the filament is.

What it costs in your state

The appliance is the same everywhere; the rate is not. Running this 3d printer costs $33 a year in Hawaii and $8.14 in Nevada — a difference of 4×.

Cost of running one 3d printer for a year, by state. Residential average price, EIA June 2026.

Other tools, hobbies and outdoors costs

• Crypto mining rig

  $4,820 a year

  A single ASIC unit running around the clock.

• Oxygen concentrator

  $375 a year

  A stationary home unit at a moderate flow rate, sixteen hours a day.

• Pottery kiln

  $190 a year

  A medium studio kiln fired roughly twice a month to cone 6.

• Electric fireplace

  $97 a year

  Evenings through winter with the heater on.

• Home server or NAS

  $96 a year

  A four-bay NAS running continuously.

• Radon mitigation fan

  $96 a year

  A typical sub-slab depressurisation fan running as installed.

Questions

Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Electric Power Monthly, Table 5.6.A, June 2026. U.S. Government work, public domain.

How every figure on this page is computed · Where the data comes from