3D Printing InfoPrinter comparison
Bambu Lab A2L vs Original Prusa XL+ Single-Tool
Compare hardware, build volume, printing specifications, dated prices and sources.
2 selected · all documented properties
Open these two in the interactive comparisonMore Bambu Lab A2L comparisonsMore Original Prusa XL+ Single-Tool comparisons
| Property | Bambu Lab A2LBEDSLINGER | Original Prusa XL+ Single-ToolCOREXY |
|---|---|---|
| Identity | ||
| Brand | Bambu Lab | Prusa Research |
| Class | BEDSLINGER | COREXY |
| Identity & Market | ||
| Manufacturer & exact marketed model name (verify the exact product identity first) | Bambu Lab A2L[1] | Original Prusa XL+, Single-Tool variant ("Prusa XL+ Single-Tool" in the e-shop variant data)[2][3] |
| Release date (announcement and actual shipping) | Pre-orders opened 1 June 2026 (Tom's Hardware spec box); Tom's Hardware review published 27 June 2026[4] | The XL+ refresh was announced on 13 August 2026, on sale immediately in all toolhead configurations, with assembled printers shipping later in August 2026 and upgrade kits for existing XL owners from around the end of August. The original Original Prusa XL predates it[5] |
| Launch MSRP (USD) | $469 standalone, $569 Combo at launch[4] | Not documented |
| Street price (USD; dated snapshot per entry) | From $469.00 on the Bambu Lab US store, Aug 2026[6] | $2,128.70 on prusa3d.com, Aug 2026 (lowest listed price for the Single-Tool variant; the Enclosure bundle starts at $2,610.19)[2] |
| Variants & sibling models — and how to tell them apart (spec-contamination risk) | Standalone and Combo (with AMS lite) SKUs, and an optional cutting/drawing module (blade cutter and pen plotter, 300x300 mm cutting area) that is a separate attachment, not a printer variant. Do not carry A1 or A1 mini figures across: the A2L is a different, much larger machine at 12.8 kg[1][4] | The XL+ is sold in Single-Tool, Dual-Head and Five-Head variants at $2,128.70, $2,768.52 and $3,610.18 respectively (Aug 2026), plus Enclosure bundles and a Critical Infrastructure edition. The frame is the same in all of them - Prusa states the frame is ready for toolheads to be added at any time - so build volume, bed and electronics figures are shared and only the toolhead count and price differ. The XL+ is itself a revision of the Original Prusa XL: the older XL aligned toolheads with a mechanical pin, the XL+ uses a dedicated electronic sensor, adds a nozzle wiper and is claimed to print 10-15% faster[2][3] |
| Market position: superseded? successor announced? | Not documented | Current model; an Original Prusa XL to Prusa XL+ upgrade kit is sold for existing owners[3] |
| Physical & Frame | ||
| Build volume X×Y×Z (mm) — advertised vs actually usable | 330 x 320 x 325 mm (manufacturer figure)[1] | 360 x 360 x 360 mm, which Prusa states as 46.7 litres[2] |
| Machine footprint (mm) & clearance needed (cable/spool overhang) | 544 x 529 x 505 mm[1] | About 700 x 900 x 720 mm (Prusa's own figure is approximate)[2] |
| Net weight (kg) | 12.8 kg net[1] | About 30 kg[2] |
| Frame construction & material | Aluminium and steel chassis with a plastic outer frame; Tom's Hardware describes a triangular gantry frame the base drops into[1] | Aluminium extrusions and steel sheets (Prusa's comparison table for the XL)[7] |
| Enclosure: open / enclosed; panel material; door/lid | Open frame, no enclosure[1] | Open frame. The Enclosure for Prusa XL+ is an optional add-on; Prusa says the printer is ready for chamber temperatures up to 60 C, that the new better-sealed enclosure reaches around 50 C on the printer's own waste heat, and that 60 C needs an upcoming chamber heater for which no shipping date has been given[2][5] |
| Kinematics & Motion Hardware | ||
| Kinematics (bedslinger i3 / CoreXY / other) | Cartesian bed-slinger - Tom's Hardware's assembly description has the heatbed bolting to a Y-carriage inside the gantry frame[4] | CoreXY with 1.5 mm GT belts, Input Shaper and Phase Stepping[2] |
| Z-axis: leadscrew count & type, sync mechanism, anti-backlash | Not published in the spec sheet; no teardown source found that documents the Z drive[1] | Not documented |
| Belts (type, width, e.g. Gates?) | Not documented | 1.5 mm GT belts[2] |
| Speed & Acceleration | ||
| Max print speed (claimed, mm/s) | 500 mm/s max toolhead speed (manufacturer claim)[1] | Not documented |
| Max acceleration (claimed, mm/s²) | 10 m/s2 = 10000 mm/s2 max toolhead acceleration (manufacturer claim)[1] | Not documented |
| Max volumetric flow claimed (mm³/s) | 28 mm3/s claimed, measured by Bambu on a 150 mm round single-wall model in Bambu PLA Basic at 220 C - note this test uses PLA, unlike the ABS-based figures Bambu quotes for its enclosed machines, so it is not directly comparable[1] | Not documented |
| Vibration Compensation / Input Shaping | ||
| Input shaping supported? Implementation (Klipper IS / Marlin ZV / proprietary) | Not documented | Input Shaper and Phase Stepping[2] |
| Extruder | ||
| Type (direct drive / bowden) & design name | Direct drive with a servo extruder motor and hardened-steel extruder gears; built-in filament cutter[1] | Nextruder direct drive; each toolhead carries its own extruder, hotend, nozzle and filament[2] |
| Hotend & Nozzle | ||
| Hotend design (proprietary/standard; quick-swap mechanism?) | Stainless-steel nozzle; 0.2/0.4/0.6/0.8 mm supported. Bambu's A2L sheet does not state whether the hotend is all-metal[1] | Quick-swap nozzles - 0.25 mm for detail, 0.6/0.8 mm for speed, hardened steel for abrasives, high-flow CHT for throughput; toolheads ship with high-flow nozzles[2] |
| Max nozzle temp claimed AND firmware max temp limit (both values) | 300 C claimed max nozzle temperature[1] | 290 C claimed max nozzle temperature[2] |
| Heated Bed & Surface | ||
| Max bed temp claimed AND firmware limit | 80 C max heatbed temperature[1] | 120 C max heatbed temperature[2] |
| Bed surface (material, texture, coating), single/double-sided | Textured PEI plate included; Engineering Plate and Cool Plate SuperTack also supported[1] | Segmented heatbed of 16 individually controlled tiles across the 360 x 360 mm surface, so only the tiles under the part are powered; removable double-sided satin print sheet supplied[2] |
| Leveling & Z-Offset | ||
| Auto bed leveling: probe technology (inductive / strain gauge / load cell / touch probe) | Automatic bed levelling with automatic Z: Tom's Hardware confirms the nozzle is used as the probe and the machine can re-check level before each print[4] | Load-cell sensor - the nozzle is the probe, which Prusa says automatically accounts for nozzle changes, surface textures and thermal expansion and removes manual Z-offsets. Toolhead-to-toolhead alignment on the XL+ uses a separate permanently mounted eddy-current Tool Offset Sensor, replacing the removable mechanical pin used on the original XL[2][5] |
| Filament Handling & Detection | ||
| Filament runout sensor (type, location) | Yes - run-out sensor, filament odometry, tangle sensor and clumping detection[1] | Filament sensors fitted; Prusa's comparison table lists two filament sensors for the XL[7] |
| Cooling & Air Handling | ||
| Part-cooling fan(s): count, size, ducting design | Part-cooling fan and hotend cooling fan, both closed-loop controlled. No auxiliary part-cooling fan and no chamber fan[1] | 360-degree part cooling on each toolhead, new on the XL+ and matching the MK4S and CORE One arrangement; Prusa states it delivers more airflow and distributes it more evenly around the nozzle. Additional fans and heatsinks cool the electronics. Fan sizes are not published[2][5] |
| Electronics & Power | ||
| Mainboard model & MCU (exact chip markings if teardowns exist) | Not documented | Custom 32-bit xBuddy electronics with STM32 (Prusa's comparison table for the XL)[7] |
| Firmware & Openness | ||
| Firmware base & current version (Klipper fork / Marlin fork / proprietary) | Closed-source proprietary firmware - not a Klipper or Marlin derivative, and no printer-firmware source is published. The bambulab GitHub organisation carries 11 repositories (Bambu Studio, wxWidgets/boost/ffmpeg forks, the wiki); none is printer firmware. Updates are delivered over the air via Bambu Studio / Bambu Handy[8] | Open-source firmware - Prusa states "Firmware: Open-source; ships with the full current Prusa feature set", and the XL is covered by the prusa3d/Prusa-Firmware-Buddy source tree[2][9] |
| Connectivity, UI & Camera | ||
| Display: size, type, touch? | 3.5-inch 240x320 touchscreen[1] | 3.5-inch 65k-colour screen with touch control (Prusa's comparison table for the XL)[7] |
| On-device UI capabilities (model preview, per-object controls, etc.) | Touchscreen plus mobile app and PC app[1] | On-device touch UI; Prusa Connect and the Prusa mobile app are optional - Prusa states the machine is fully offline capable[7][2] |
| WiFi (band/standard), Ethernet, USB ports, SD/flash-drive | 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi only (802.11 b/g/n), Bambu-Bus, microSD card. Ethernet not available[1] | Ethernet, optional Wi-Fi; USB drive for print files. Prusa Connect optional and fully offline operation supported[2][7] |
| Camera: built-in / optional? Resolution & framerate (verify — marketing often omits real fps) | Built-in low-frame-rate camera, up to 1080p, timelapse supported[1] | Not documented |
| Materials Support | ||
| Officially supported filament list | Suitable: PLA, PETG, TPU, PVA. PLA-CF and PETG-CF suitable only after fitting a hardened-steel nozzle. ABS, ASA, PA, PC and PET are listed as not recommended on the compare page[1][10] | PLA, PETG, ASA, ABS, PC, PA (nylon), TPU, PVA, HIPS, PP, CPE, PVB and carbon-fibre composites. Prusa states an open material policy - any brand of 1.75 mm filament, no chips and no subscriptions[2] |
| Safety | ||
| Thermal runaway protection (verify in firmware source if at all possible) | Not documented | Open-source firmware on the xBuddy platform, which carries hardware overcurrent protection cutting heater and heatbed power above 15 A[11][9] |
| Reliability, Support & Ecosystem | ||
| Warranty length & support reputation (evidence, not vibes) | 2-year limited warranty for consumers in the US, Canada, the EU, Switzerland, Norway and Iceland; 1 year in the rest of the world. Bambu Lab's own policy records the US/Canada term as a 2026 extension from one year to two[12] | 2-year warranty for consumers in the EU, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, Norway and Iceland; 1 year for EU enterprises and 1 year for the rest of the world, which includes the United States. A printer bought from a reseller or privately carries 1 year from the original delivery date and is handled by the reseller. Prusa advertises 24/7 chat and e-mail support in seven languages[13][7] |
| Independently Measured Performance | ||
| Review scores from major outlets (list outlet + score + date) | Tom's Hardware: Editor's Choice, rating 4.5 out of 5 in the page's structured data (27 June 2026)[4] | Not documented |
Manufacturer claims, independent measurements, packages and test conditions retain their source wording. FDM linear speed and resin vertical speed use different units and are not directly comparable. Unknown values are marked “Not documented”. Prices and source dates remain historical snapshots; check the linked guide for product details. Differences highlight text, not a universal winner.
Sources for this comparison
- Bambu Lab A2L Spec Sheet (PDF) store.bblcdn.com · 2026-08 · doc
- Original Prusa XL+ product page (spec block and variant price data) prusa3d.com · 2026-08 · vendor
- Prusa 3D printers category listing with live e-shop prices, Aug 2026 prusa3d.com · 2026-08 · vendor
- Tom's Hardware - Bambu Lab A2L 3D printer review, 27 June 2026 tomshardware.com · 2026-08 · review
- Prusa blog - Better Prints, Easier Use: Prusa XL+, CORE One L+ and CORE One+ (Gen 2), Our Big Product Update (published 13 August 2026) blog.prusa3d.com · 2026-08 · doc
- Bambu Lab US Store - 3D Printers collection listing (base prices, Aug 2026) us.store.bambulab.com · 2026-08 · vendor
- Original Prusa MK4S 3D Printer product page (Technical Parameters + CORE One+/MK4S/XL comparison table) prusa3d.com · 2026-08 · vendor
- GitHub - bambulab organisation repository list (11 repos, checked Aug 2026) github.com · 2026-08 · doc
- GitHub - prusa3d/Prusa-Firmware-Buddy (firmware for MINI, MK4, XL and CORE One) github.com · 2026-08 · doc
- Bambu Lab - Compare all 3D printers (A2L / X2D / H2C columns) bambulab.com · 2026-08 · vendor
- Prusa blog - Original Prusa MK4 is here (published 29 March 2023), including the MK4 specification table and launch prices blog.prusa3d.com · 2026-08 · doc
- Bambu Lab Warranty Policy bambulab.com · 2026-08 · vendor
- Prusa Knowledge Base - Warranty help.prusa3d.com · 2026-08 · doc