Pricing 3D prints: why I built my own print-shop app
3DCDesign started with one question, what a print actually costs, and grew into a local-first app for makers and small print shops.
3DCDesign started with one headache: pricing prints. Working out what a print actually costs, from filament to print time, and quoting customers the same way every time was the problem I wanted solved. So I built myself a tool for it.
Estimates first
The cost and time estimates are still the part I’m proudest of. You set up a profile for each printer you own and keep your materials in the app, and every estimate starts from those saved defaults instead of a blank calculator. An estimate can become a customer-safe PDF to send, or an internal one with your own numbers, and it’s kept in a local document history.
From one tool to a whole shop
Once the estimates worked, the rest of the shop followed: print jobs logged with their printer, material, costs, and customer or quote details; filament and resin inventory with stock history and reorder signals; monthly reports; and Print Analytics for printer workload, material usage, quote value, tracked cost, and estimated margin. It can also connect to a Moonraker/Klipper, OctoPrint, or PrusaLink host on your own network.
Why it stays on your device
There’s no login and no server. Your records stay on your phone or tablet, for three reasons. Quotes, costs, and margins are business data, and a maker’s data should be theirs, not sitting in someone else’s cloud. A garage or shop doesn’t always have good signal, and a local app always works. And with no servers to pay for, the core tracking tools can stay free. Premium Backup is an optional subscription for creating portable backup files, and restoring one never needs it.
Where it is now
3DCDesign is live on the App Store and Google Play, free to download. It runs on the same .NET MAUI base as Adventure Cache, Your Whey Fitness, and Cache Creature. The 3DCDesign page has screenshots and store links.