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You have a printer. You have filament. You printed a few test cubes. Now what? The accessories you add around your 3D printer can have a bigger impact on print quality and reliability than almost any printer upgrade. These are the five that are genuinely worth buying in 2026.
1. PEI Spring Steel Magnetic Bed Sheet
This is the single best upgrade you can make to almost any FDM printer. A PEI-coated spring steel sheet sits on a magnetic base and gives you a grippy print surface that releases prints effortlessly once the bed cools. No more prying, no more spatulas snapping, no more prints you cannot get off the glass without scratching everything.
PLA, PETG, and ABS all adhere well to PEI without glue. For printers that did not come with one (Ender 3, Prusa clones, older Creality machines), this is a near-essential purchase.
Browse PEI spring steel bed sheets on Amazon UK
2. Digital Vernier Calipers
If you are designing or modifying parts for real-world use, you need calipers. A decent digital vernier caliper lets you measure anything — the gap you need to fill, the bolt diameter, the thickness of a wall — to 0.01mm accuracy. Every 3D printing hobbyist eventually buys a pair, usually after spending two hours on a part that does not fit because they guessed.
You do not need to spend much. A £15–20 set from Amazon is accurate enough for printing work. Just make sure it reads in millimetres (most do) and has a zero/reset button.
3. Filament Dry Box and Desiccant
Filament absorbs moisture from the air. Wet filament pops, bubbles, and strings — and the results can be almost unrecognisable compared to the same material printed fresh. If you have been blaming your printer for bad quality, damp filament is the cause far more often than people realise.
The solution is a sealed dry box with desiccant. You can buy purpose-made ones that feed filament directly to your printer, or you can use an airtight food storage container with silica gel sachets and a PTFE tube for the filament output. Either way, if you print PETG, Nylon, or TPU — materials that are especially hygroscopic — a dry box is non-negotiable.
- Filament dry box with feeder — Amazon UK
- Active filament dryer (heats filament to remove moisture) — Amazon UK
- Silica gel desiccant sachets — Amazon UK
4. Flush Cutters and Deburring Tool
Every print has a small nub where the first layer started, or stringy wisps between travel moves. Flush cutters let you snip these cleanly. A deburring tool lets you clean up holes and edges in seconds — twist it once around the opening and it shaves off the slight roughness left by layer lines.
Neither costs more than a few pounds and both will be used on every single print you make.
5. Isopropyl Alcohol (IPA) and Spray Bottle
Clean your print bed before every session. Fingerprint oil is the number one cause of first-layer adhesion failures on PEI surfaces. A spray bottle of 99% isopropyl alcohol and a microfibre cloth take about ten seconds and fix the problem completely. IPA also works for degreasing metal parts before gluing or painting prints.
Buy IPA in at least a 500ml bottle — you will go through it faster than you expect. Avoid anything below 90% concentration as the water content slows evaporation and leaves residue.
- 99% IPA (isopropyl alcohol) — Amazon UK
- Small spray bottle — Amazon UK
- Microfibre cloths — Amazon UK
Bonus: What to Buy If You Have a Bigger Budget
If you have already got the basics and want to invest further, these are the next best purchases for most hobbyists:
- Printer enclosure — essential for ABS, useful for reducing draught effects on any material
- Auto bed levelling probe (BLTouch / CRTouch) — for printers without it; eliminates manual tramming entirely
- Hardened steel nozzle — necessary for abrasive filaments like carbon fibre, glow-in-the-dark, and wood fills
Browse all 3D printer accessories on Amazon UK to see the full range — there is something useful at every price point.