Articles on: Connect & set up printers

Help confirm a printer's compatibility in SimplyPrint

New printers are listed on SimplyPrint soon after they launch, with our best expectation of how they connect. Owners settle the rest from inside SimplyPrint: a short check-in on the printer's control panel, and the prints you finish anyway. This guide explains what we ask, why the first question is about modifications, and how your answers turn "Expected to work" into "Compatible" for everyone with the same printer.


In this article


Where the check-in appears

When you open your printer's control panel in SimplyPrint, a banner asks How does your (printer) work with SimplyPrint? Click Share how it went to answer. You see it if you're allowed to edit printers in the account.


You see it:

  • after the printer connects for the first time, and
  • again after its first finished print. That one also asks about starting a print. If the printer has already finished a print, you get this one straight away.


The banner only appears for printers whose model isn't Verified by SimplyPrint for the way the printer connects. A printer on the SimplyPrint Client and the same model on OctoPrint are separate questions, so you may see it even when the model is verified for another connection method. It doesn't appear for a printer you added as another model until its own is listed: what it does says nothing about the model it stands in for.


If our team is working on that model and connection method, the banner says We're looking into it instead, with the month, quarter or year we're aiming for when we have one.


Closing the banner with the X hides that check-in in that browser.


What we ask

Only the questions that apply to your printer are shown:


Question

Asked when

Is your printer stock?

Always. This is the only required answer.

Connecting the printer

Always

Webcam

The printer has a camera

Moving with the controls ("Did it move the right way?")

SimplyPrint can move this printer

Homing

SimplyPrint can home this printer

Starting a print

After the first finished print

Multi-material

A multi-material unit is set up on the printer

Anything else?

Always, optional


Each question takes Works, Partly works, Doesn't work or Didn't try. A question you leave blank is saved as "Didn't try".


Why we ask if your printer is stock

Pick Not sure if you don't know. Only Modified takes a printer out of the count.


A modified printer tells us about your printer, not the model. A new mainboard, other firmware or major mods change how a printer talks to SimplyPrint, so what works on yours may not work on the printer as it ships, and the other way around.


The choices are Stock, as it shipped, Modified (mainboard, firmware or major mods) and Not sure. If you pick Modified, you can tell us what you changed. We keep your answers, but neither they nor that printer's prints count toward the model's status.


What happens with your answers

Once a day, SimplyPrint adds up what owners' printers have done, per printer model and connection method:

  • how many accounts have connected a printer of that model, and how many printers;
  • how many prints finished;
  • how many accounts' printers have sent a webcam picture;
  • how many accounts' check-ins say connecting or printing works, and how many say it doesn't. Only each printer's latest check-in counts.


SimplyPrint's own accounts and test accounts are left out, and so is every printer whose latest check-in says it is modified, or that was added as another model until its own is listed.


For the status, the answers that count are Connecting the printer and Starting a print. Doesn't work on either is a failure report, and Works with no failure is counted as a confirmation. What moves a status up is finished prints, below. The other answers are kept with your check-in.


Nobody sees your answers on the public page. The printer's page shows the status and a usage line that never names anyone and never shows a number below 10 printers. What the compatibility statuses mean (link: article 04 once published) explains the line.


How a printer becomes Compatible automatically

A model that is Expected to work or Not confirmed yet for a connection method becomes Compatible for that method when:

  1. three different accounts have a finished print through that connection method,
  2. on printers not reported as modified,
  3. and fewer than two accounts report that connecting or starting a print doesn't work.


The prints count whether or not you answered the check-in. They need to be prints SimplyPrint tracked on the printer, not ones logged by hand or imported, and not failed or cancelled.


This only ever moves a status up. Verified by SimplyPrint stays reserved for printers our team has tested on real hardware.


When something does not work

If two or more accounts report that connecting or printing doesn't work on a printer marked Verified by SimplyPrint, Compatible or Expected to work, the SimplyPrint team gets it in their review queue, with the status one step down as a proposal. A person decides: the status never drops on its own.


When the team starts working on the model and connection method, everyone who answered Doesn't work or Partly works for connecting or starting a print in the last 90 days gets an email saying we're looking into it, once.


In the meantime, the troubleshooting article for your connection method can help:


Other ways to help

  • Not connected yet? On the printer's page, Help us confirm asks a few questions about the printer and takes you to the setup guide for the way it can most likely connect. Once it is connected, the check-in takes over.
  • Spotted a wrong spec? Did we make a mistake? on the printer's page lets you correct it and add proof. See What the compatibility statuses mean (link: article 04 once published).
  • Printing for a while? After 10 finished prints, and 14 days after you added the printer, the Printers page asks you to rate how well it works with SimplyPrint.


Updated on: 20/10/2026

Was this article helpful?

Share your feedback

Cancel

Thank you!