The Best Flexible Filaments for 3D Printing

If you’re looking for a strong and versatile flexible 3D printer filament at a good price point, SainSmart TPU is an excellent choice. With a shore hardness of 95A, it produces durable and rigid 3D prints that are still flexible enough to retain their shape even when significantly bent and deformed.

SainSmart TPU is known for having excellent bed adhesion and virtually no warping when printed with the proper settings. They even provide printer profiles for a wide variety of popular 3D printer models that you can download and load into your slicer for their best-recommended settings for your machine.

You have a lot of versatility in terms of color since SainSmart currently offers 18 different shades for this product. It also has the lowest temp range of any of the flexible 3D printer filaments on this list. If you are worried about your 3D printer’s hot end performance, this should be the easiest to get good results with.

As one of the more expensive options on the list, Ninjatek TPU filament earns its higher price point for its great print quality, ease of use, and optimal performance. Suggested for use with sports equipment, medical devices, and industrial manufacturing, it is an excellent option for commercial applications.

Ninjatek TPU is known for its vibration dampening, chemical resistance, and abrasion-resistant properties. Its shore hardness of 85A gives the material enough rigidity to withstand repeated high-impact force without failing.

Optimized for easy 3D printing, Ninjatek is textured for better feeding through the extruder. It also boasts a high degree of dimensional accuracy for easy and consistent extrusion in most 3D printers.

Another affordable flexible TPU filament option, Overture, boasts a wide variety of colors, multipacks, and additional discounts for bulk buying. If you have a large project to do and need a lot of filament, this is one of the most cost-efficient brands on the list.

Like other TPU brands, Overture has great bed adhesion and very little warping, so it is easy to get good base layers on your prints. It also has very little odor while printing, so it does not overpower your home if you have to print inside (though a ventilated 3D printer enclosure is a good practice for anyone printing within their home).

When you need a flexible material with higher heat resistance than typical flexible TPU filaments offer, using a TPC product like FormFutura FlexiFil should do the trick. With higher heat resistance comes higher print temperatures and a bigger learning curve. However, TPC filaments usually have little to no warping, so while the temperatures are closer to ABS filament, they won’t have the same adhesion problems.

In addition to heat resistance, FlexiFil is also resistant to chemicals and UV exposure. With a shore hardness of 45A, it is much softer than the other products we have looked at so far. However, with that added elasticity, it also has something called flexural memory, which means it will return to its original shape with no deformation when stretched.

Even with its softer composition, FlexiFil is strong and durable with high impact resistance. It is also a more eco-friendly option since it is made from 43% bio-materials.

Duramic’s TPU filament is notable not only for its affordable price point but also because it is specially formulated to work just as well with Bowden extruders as it does with direct-drive extruders. It’s also designed to be jam-free in general for an easier and more consistent printing experience.

It has a shore hardness of 95A and an elasticity of 300% more than its starting length, making it a rigid but impact-resistant option that is perfect for manufacturing parts and tools. Duramic TPU filament has a +/-0.05mm tolerance for good dimensional accuracy. This also helps keep clogging, jamming, and other extrusion issues to a minimum in your 3D printer.

Fillamentum offers two different versions of their FlexFill TPU filaments: 92A and 98A. These numbers refer to their respective shore hardnesses and overall rigidity. While both have fairly high levels of rigidity, the 92A line of TPU filament has higher elastic and reversible deformation properties. The 98A line of TPU filament is semi-flexible material with improved UV resistance.

Both products have high tear and tensile strength, good rebound resilience, little to no warping, and high abrasion resistance. They are both resistant to oils, greases, ozone, and aliphatic alcohols. They are also both safe to use in and around electrical and electronic equipment.

Like their TPU products, Filamentum’s TPE filament has two different products named based on their shore hardness: 90A and 96A. The 90A products are flexible while the 96A products are semi-flexible.

These products are both certified as safe for food contact and skin contact and have a soft, pleasant surface texture. They both have high degrees of tear strength and abrasion resistance. They are chemically resistant to alkalis, water, alcohol, and acids. They also have very low moisture absorption, making them ideal for outdoor use.

Their tensile strength and elasticity are much lower than the TPU lines, so consider whether you need greater strength against mechanical stress or weather conditions when choosing between the two options.

Recreus Filaflex TPU filament has several different product offerings. They have separate lines based on the product’s shore hardness and include the following measurements: 60A, 70A, 82A, and 95A. They also have specialty flexible filaments, like conductive filament and their Reciflex and Purifier lines.

The regular Filaflex options are resistant to solvents, acetone, and fuel. They are also rated safe for skin contact but have not been officially approved for food or medical use. They have good bed adhesion and don’t need adhesives or surface covers to avoid warping. They also are formulated to work well with a wide variety of 3D printers, including those with a Bowden setup.

Their specialty TPU filament options each have their own intended use. Conductive TPU is named as such because it is electrically conductive. This is useful for fabricating conductive prints for devices. Reciflex is a 100% fully recycled TPU filament using waste left over from Recreus’s own production and from waste from the footwear industry.

Filaflex Purifier is especially interesting. It is designed to be a sustainable environmentally-friendly 3D printer filament option. It absorbs pollutants and greenhouse gasses and turns them to mineral waste using a process known as gas mineralization.

PolyFlex TPU filament is another excellent option for flexible filaments. It is a rigid material with a shore hardness of 95A, with enough elasticity to keep its impact resistance high. It is designed to be compatible with a wide variety of machines, though it does still suggest the use of a direct drive extruder in your 3D printer.

It comes in a resealable aluminum package and has a filament gauge and print settings printed directly onto the spool. It has limited color options, but each color available is vibrant and available in both common diameters (1.75 mmand 2.85 mm).

If you want a multipurpose flexible filament for your 3D printing projects, ColorFabb’s Ngen Flex TPU filament is an excellent choice. Designed to work across multiple 3D printer models, you can use it with a Bowden extruder at a normal print speed with little to no issues. This product is as close to using a traditional 3D printer filament as a flexible filament can get.

Because it is temperature resistant up to 125°C, your 3D prints can be steam-sterilized. This trade-off comes at needing a slightly higher printing temperature than the other TPU filaments on this list. It also moves a heated bed from an optional feature to a requirement.

The Pro Series TPU filament by MatterHackers is another excellent choice for when you need a reliable and strong flexible 3D printer filament. With a +/-0.02mm tolerance, they have some of the most refined dimensional accuracy allowances in the flexible filament market. Most of the other TPU filaments have a tolerance range of +/- 0.05-0.10mm.

Dimensional accuracy is especially important when dealing with flexible filaments since jams and clogs are already an issue due to their elasticity, so if you want a brand with excellent quality control and fewer mechanical failures on your 3D printer, MatterHackers Pro Series is an excellent choice.