LW-PLA Lightweight Foaming PLA
PLA with a foaming agent that cuts printed weight roughly in half. The grade RC plane builders swear by, shown as LW-PLA on our deals cards.
Last updated: July 2026
LW-PLA (lightweight PLA) contains a heat-activated foaming agent. Print it hot enough (usually 230-260°C) and it expands to two or even three times its extruded volume. You compensate by cutting flow to 40-60%, and the result is a printed part with the same outer dimensions at roughly half the density of standard PLA: about 0.6-0.8 g/cm³ instead of 1.24.
This is a specialist grade with one dominant community: RC aircraft. A wing printed in single-wall LW-PLA is light enough to fly and stiff enough to survive landings, which regular PLA simply cannot do at flyable weight. The same properties make it interesting for cosplay armor (large pieces, wearable weight) and props, where the slightly foamy matte surface even helps hide layer lines.
The trade-off is tuning. Foaming rate depends on temperature, so every spool needs a flow-calibration tower: print test sections at increasing temps, measure wall thickness, and set flow for your chosen temp. Skip that step and you get either gaps (under-extrusion) or blobbed, over-inflated walls. colorFabb invented the grade and their documentation is still the best starting point; eSUN's ePLA-LW is the budget option that made it mainstream.
Weight is the only reason to buy it. At full foam a part weighs 40-55% of its solid-PLA equivalent, which transforms anything that flies and helps anything that gets worn. Strength per wall-millimeter drops, so LW-PLA designs lean on geometry (curved skins, ribs, spars) instead of brute-force perimeters.
Cost per printed part is friendlier than the per-kg price suggests: you are extruding half the mass, so a €40 spool of LW-PLA goes roughly twice as far as its weight implies. It is still a premium product; check the live table below because prices swing between €30 and €45/kg.
If you only want a matte, layer-line-hiding surface and not the weight savings, matte PLA gets you the look for a third of the price with none of the tuning. LW-PLA earns its cost only when grams matter.
colorFabb LW-PLA (the original, best documentation), eSUN ePLA-LW (the value pick, usually €30/kg), Polymaker, Spectrum, and Recreus. All are in the live price table below.