Nylon is the print-settings guide where the honest answer to “what temperature should I use” is “it depends which nylon you bought.” PA6, PA12, and proprietary blends like Taulman’s Bridge and Alloy 910 are all sold under the same “nylon” label, but they melt at different temperatures, warp by different amounts, and tolerate moisture differently, so settings that work perfectly on one spool can ruin a print on another. This guide covers the nozzle temperature spread across formulations, why drying nylon before printing is not optional, bed adhesion and warping, enclosure needs, print speed, and why the brand-to-brand variance is so much wider here than with PLA or PETG. The engineering filaments overview covers nylon alongside polycarbonate and other high-performance materials at a glance; this guide goes deeper into the actual parameters. For how nylon compares to other filaments before you buy a spool, see the 3D printer filament types guide. For a direct comparison against PETG on strength, moisture and cost, see the nylon vs PETG guide. For how nylon compares to ABS specifically, see the ABS vs nylon guide.
Nozzle temperature: why the range depends on the formulation, not just the brand
Prusa’s knowledge base recommends 285°C for its Prusament PA11 Carbon Fiber, treating pure polyamide’s print settings as close to polycarbonate’s. Polymaker’s guidance splits by chemistry: PA6-based filaments in the 260°C to 280°C range, PA12 lower at roughly 230°C to 270°C depending on which of its own sources you read, and PA12-CF pushed as high as 300°C once carbon fiber is added. Taulman’s Bridge nylon, a blend designed specifically to print more like a standard engineering filament, runs cooler still at 250°C to 265°C. MatterHackers splits the difference with a broad 240°C to 260°C recommendation and suggests starting at 250°C and moving in 5°C steps. Stack these together and pure PA6 tends to want the most heat, PA12 and Taulman-style blends want noticeably less, and carbon-fiber-filled nylons can run hotter than either. There’s no single number to memorize here, check the spool’s technical data sheet before you print, and make sure your hotend can actually reach and hold whatever it recommends: MatterHackers is blunt that standard PTFE-lined hotends degrade at nylon temperatures, and an all-metal hotend like the E3D V6 is the baseline expectation.
Drying nylon: the step that decides whether the print works at all
Nylon is the most hygroscopic material most people will ever load into a printer. MatterHackers and Prusa both cite the same figure, up to 10% of the filament’s weight in absorbed water, and one materials-science study (published in a peer-reviewed additive manufacturing journal) found that a nylon spool can pick up enough moisture to affect print quality in as little as two to eight hours at high humidity, depending on brand and filament diameter. Wet nylon doesn’t just string, it forms steam bubbles inside the melt that show up as pockmarks and weak, delaminating layers. This guide won’t repeat the drying procedure step by step, the how to dry 3D printer filament guide already covers that in depth, but it’s worth flagging how much the recommended drying temperatures and times vary by source: Prusa suggests at least 4 hours below 90°C, Polymaker recommends 80°C for 8-12 hours for PA6 or 70°C for 6-8 hours for PA12, and other manufacturer guidance goes as high as 95°C for 7 hours as an upper bound. MatterHackers dries at 75°C for 8-12 hours in an active dryer, or 71°C to 82°C for 6-8 hours in a household oven. Treat that whole 70°C to 95°C, 6 to 16-plus hour range as evidence that you need your specific spool’s number, not a universal one, and if you’re printing a long job, keep the filament in a dry box or feeding through an active dryer rather than sitting on an open spool holder, since nylon reabsorbs moisture fast enough to undo a full drying cycle within a single humid afternoon. If a print starts stringing or popping partway through a long job, the wet filament symptoms guide can help confirm whether moisture is the culprit.
Bed adhesion and warping
MatterHackers describes nylon as warping “about as much as ABS,” which lines up with Prusa listing warping as pure polyamide’s main printing disadvantage. Bed temperature recommendations vary by surface as much as by brand: MatterHackers recommends 55°C to 65°C on garolite with a PVA glue stick, but 70°C to 80°C on glass or PEI with the same glue. Taulman’s own guidance for Bridge nylon splits similarly, around 55°C on glass with PVA, up to 70-80°C on PEI. Polymaker’s range is wider still, room temperature up to 100°C, depending on the specific PA blend and build surface. Prusa recommends a dedicated PA-specific sheet where possible. That’s a real spread, not a rounding error, and it means the bed temperature that works for a friend’s nylon spool on a glass bed may do nothing for yours on PEI. A PVA-based glue stick (not a generic glue stick) applied in a cross-hatch pattern is the adhesion method every source agrees on regardless of surface, and a brim helps on anything with sharp outer corners. Carbon-fiber-filled nylons are the exception to most of this: Prusa notes that CF-reinforced polyamide warps far less than the unfilled version and can often be printed without an enclosure at all.
Enclosure needs
Unfilled nylon benefits from the same high, stable ambient temperature that ABS and ASA need, and for the same reason, uneven cooling between the outer shell and the core is what causes the warping described above. Prusa’s guidance is to print in an enclosure whenever possible, reserving the exception for carbon-fiber and glass-fiber grades that are inherently less prone to shrinking unevenly. There’s a second reason to keep nylon enclosed that doesn’t apply to ABS or ASA: Prusa notes that polyamide releases a strong odor along with ultrafine particles during printing, so ventilation or filtration matters here as much as temperature control does.
Print speed
MatterHackers, Polymaker and Taulman all land in a similar band for print speed, 30mm/s to 60mm/s, with Taulman specifically recommending 40mm/s for Bridge nylon. Layer heights of 0.2mm to 0.4mm are standard. Cooling fans are where every source agrees without exception: Taulman’s own documentation states that fans should be off for all nylon-based materials unless the part cross-section is smaller than about 10 square millimeters, MatterHackers specifies 0% layer cooling, and Polymaker’s guidance tops out at 20% for the rare case where a small overhang needs it. Treat the fan as off by default and only reach for it if a specific small feature is drooping.
PA6, PA12 and blends: why nylon settings vary so much more than PLA’s do
Most of the range described above traces back to the fact that “nylon” isn’t one polymer. PA6 is the stiffer, higher-melting-point formulation, and it’s the one Prusa’s 285°C recommendation and Polymaker’s 260-280°C range are describing. PA12 melts lower and tends to be less brittle, which is part of why Polymaker and MatterHackers both quote cooler numbers for it. Then there are blends like Taulman’s Bridge and Alloy 910, engineered specifically to close the gap between raw polyamide’s difficulty and something closer to an ABS-level printing experience, with lower bed temperature requirements and less dramatic warping than unmodified PA6 or PA12. None of these are wrong, they’re different materials competing for the same “nylon” label on a spool. That’s the reason this guide keeps citing ranges instead of a single number: if you buy a new nylon filament and start from settings tuned for a different formulation, you’re troubleshooting the wrong variable. Start from the manufacturer’s own technical data sheet for that specific spool, and use the ranges here as a sanity check rather than a replacement.
Nylon settings checklist
- Dry the spool before printing (drying temperatures and times vary by brand from roughly 70°C to 95°C over 6 to 16-plus hours), and keep it dry while printing on long jobs.
- Nozzle temperature somewhere between 230°C and 300°C depending on whether it’s PA6, PA12, a blend, or carbon-fiber-filled, always checked against the spool’s TDS.
- All-metal hotend rated for 250°C or higher; standard PTFE-lined hotends degrade at nylon temperatures.
- Bed temperature and surface matched to your specific filament and build plate, with a PVA-based glue stick for adhesion regardless of surface.
- Cooling fan off by default, only used sparingly on small overhanging features.
- Enclosure for unfilled nylon to control warping and manage fumes; carbon-fiber and glass-fiber grades are more forgiving without one.