Printables Articles - Your Own Personal Blog on Printables! | Articles

It's a little meta, we know, but what better way to announce our new Articles feature than by writing an article about it? We hate cooking recipes where you first have to hear about the author's grandma's life story and only get to the ingredients and instructions on page 9. So here are first the whats and we’ll get to the whys later.

Think of Articles as your own personal blog on Printables. They provide a powerful, easy-to-use platform for sharing more than just a quick post.

Key Features

Powerful WYSIWYG Editor

Our new editor allows you to create beautifully formatted articles with ease. Add images, embed videos, create tables, and use rich text formatting.

Draft and Publish States

Work on your articles at your own pace and publish them when you're ready.

Instant Preview

No reloads, you can switch between the editor and the preview instantly.

Automatic Table of Contents

Four or more headings? We will automatically generate a table of contents to help readers jump to the sections they care about most.

Comments with threads

Readers can leave comments, and others can reply in threads to keep conversations organized.

Shareable and Embeddable

Each heading in an article gets its own anchor, making it easy to share specific sections. You can also embed your articles on other websites using HTML code snippet.

Easy Analytics

See how your articles are performing with built-in tracking for views, likes, and estimated read time.

Club Members-only Content

For creators with a Club, Articles can be a fantastic way to offer exclusive value to your supporters. Share behind the scenes, early previews, or monetize your expertise and detailed guides. You can set an article to "Members-only" mode, where non-members will only see a teaser, encouraging them to join your community.

You can even embed source code like this:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<body>

<h1>Printables Articles are here!</h1>

<p>My first paragraph.</p>

</body>
</html>

Where are articles displayed?

On your user profile: Your two most recent articles will be highlighted on your profile, visitors will now also see a new “Articles” tab with a full list of your work.
On the homepage: A new section highlights the latest and greatest, automatically sorted by recency and likes.
In the Community feed: You can now easily browse articles, posts, or just new models.

Can you count how many times it says “Printables” in the image?

Why did we make this?

You may be asking why we decided to do this, especially since you could already write long descriptions with images and videos. The answer is simple: We want to give you the right tool for the job. A 3D model page is all about the model. And, of course, not every post or guide you want to share has a 3D model to go with it.

We've also heard your feedback that the standard Community posts don't always provide enough space or formatting options for these more in-depth write ups.

Articles, on the other hand, are designed from the ground up to showcase your writing, your guides, and your stories. The user experience is built for reading, not just downloading. This is a huge step for our community, giving you a proper place to share build logs, work-in-progress, detailed instructions, and so much more, even when there's no model to go with it.

This also creates a great new option for creators. Instead of having to split their content between Printables (for 3D models) and their own website or other platforms for the updates, articles and news, you can now bring that detailed content here and even monetize it for your Club members.

Hey wait, there’s more news?

While the launch of Articles is the main news here, we've also been busy with a few other quality-of-life updates and fixes.

New Features & Improvements

You can now set a default license for all your newly published models in your Settings.
We've added the ability to delete a conversation with a user from your Messenger.
When you gain a new supporter for your Club, the email notification now includes their specific Tier information.
The initial number of Store models has been increased from 1 to 3 and when you unlock more slots through sales, you'll now receive both an in-app notification and an email.

Bringing it all together

We've been working hard to create a place for sharing 3D printable models that we love, and we really hope that with the new Articles feature, Printables can become the go-to spot for everything related to 3D printing. We're really looking forward to seeing the amazing content you'll create with this new feature. Whether it’s a guide to your favorite filament, a project story of a complex build, or just some behind-the-scenes thoughts on your design process, now you have the perfect place to share it.

Happy printing, and happy writing!