Getting a price for your part
When Instant Quote answers on its own, when to raise an RFQ instead, and what your design file needs to carry.
There are two ways to find out what a part costs. Instant Quote gives you an indicative number in your browser, in seconds, without an account. An RFQ asks real workshops for a real price they will stand behind. Use the first to sanity-check a budget, the second to actually buy something.
When Instant Quote is enough
Open Instant Quote, drop in an STL, and pick a process, a material and a quantity. Your model is analysed in your browser — nothing is uploaded — and you get an estimate along with the workshops able to make it.
It is the right tool when you are checking whether a design is affordable at all, comparing two materials, or seeing how the price per unit falls as quantity rises. It is the wrong tool for committing to anything, because no shop has looked at your part yet.
Raising an RFQ, which is what you actually buy from
An RFQ is one request for a price, raised against a Part and sent to workshops you choose. Each shop sees its own copy — they do not see each other, and they do not see each other's prices.
Open the part and check its requirements
Process, material and quantity must be set. In Requirements, write down what the geometry cannot say: tolerances that matter, the finish you need, whether it lives outdoors, what it bolts to.The part shows Ready and the Get quotes action is available.
Choose which shops to ask
You are offered only shops actually set up for your process, with their city and usual turnaround. Three to five gives you a genuine range without drowning you in chat threads.If no shops appear, no workshop on the marketplace is currently configured for that process and material combination — try a more common material, or ask Support.
Send the request
This is when your design file is uploaded. Until now it has been on your own machine.The part moves to Quoting and the requests appear in Active RFQs.
Answer questions while you wait
Every request has its own chat with that shop. Questions before a quote are a good sign — it means someone opened your file.Responses arrive over hours to a couple of days, depending on the shop and the complexity of the part.
What your design file needs to carry
A quote is only as good as what the shop can work out from what you sent. Five things account for most of the back-and-forth:
- The model in the right units. An STL carries no units. A part exported in inches and read as millimetres is the single most common cause of a wrong quote.
- Tolerances, only where they matter. Marking every dimension tight makes the whole part expensive. Name the two or three that actually need it.
- What the surface has to be. “As printed” and “smooth enough to paint” are different jobs at different prices.
- Quantity, honestly. Asking for one and then ordering fifty means re-quoting. Ask for the number you intend to buy.
- A drawing, if you have one. Attach it as a reference file on the part. For anything machined, a drawing is worth more than a paragraph.
The same bracket rendered twice at the same angle: once palm-sized, and once more than twenty-five times larger
Artwork pending — prompt at getting-a-price--units-mismatch.prompt.txt
Instant Quote or RFQ?
- Use Instant Quote when you need a number in the next minute, are comparing design options, or are writing a budget.
- Raise an RFQ when you intend to buy, when the part has requirements a calculator cannot see, or when delivery date matters as much as price.
In short
Instant Quote answers “roughly how much?” in seconds. An RFQ answers “what will you actually charge me, and when?” in a day or two. Next: comparing what comes back.