Top 3 Sites to find free 3D print models. (STL)

So you’ve finally purchased your first 3D printer, now what? Most 3D printers will come with an SD card with a few models preloaded on them which will either be STL files (Standard Tessellation Language) or Gcode (Geometric Code). But after you’ve finish printing your first small dog or pig, you’ll want to find other files to print. Here is the top 3 sites we use.

Where to find free STL models online?

Printables by Prusa Printers ( https://www.printables.com/ )

Prusa Printers is known for their out of the box, just works, quality printers. Started by Josef Prusa in 2012 they’ve achieved a great reputation within the 3D printer community. Prusa has just realeased their very own file sharing platform. Currently it does not have largest variety of prints, but with a great search function, and a team which has proven themself with their 3D printers, this site should grow into something larger. With contests and the opportunity to earn Prusameters which can be traded in for Prusa filament it is surely one of our favorites

Thingiverse ( https://www.thingiverse.com/ )

Started in 2008 as a companion site to MakerBot , Thingiverse has become one of the largest 3D printing design communities online. Though being one of the largest, Thingiverse receives criticism for their lake of maintenance to their site, namely their poor search function.

Thangs ( https://thangs.com/ )

Thangs claims to be the fastest growing 3D community. Started by Physna, a company which specialize in teaching computers how to read and sort 3D data. Thangs is not only another database to share 3D models, they can also be used as a sort of Google for 3D objects.