Bambu Lab P1S Review: The Enclosed Printer for Real Materials

The P1S is the enclosed sibling of the A1, with the same 256 mm cube build volume. It earns its extra cost through the box around it.

Why the enclosure matters

PLA prints anywhere. ABS and ASA shrink as they cool, and on an open bed the corners lift and the layers split. An enclosure keeps the air around the print warm and still, and that is the difference between an ASA part that works and one that cracks. For workshop use, ASA is worth the trouble. It survives sun and heat that would soften PLA, which matters for anything in a car or a hot shed. See filament types explained.

The enclosure also keeps fumes and some of the noise in, and dust out.

The hotend reaches 300 °C and the bed 100 °C, which covers almost every common filament. It is a CoreXY machine, so the bed only moves down, which keeps tall prints steadier than on a bed that slides back and forth.

The rough edges

• Interface. A small monochrome screen and a D-pad. You will mostly drive it from the slicer or the phone app.
• Camera. It takes a still every few seconds rather than streaming video. Fine for timelapses, poor for watching a print fail.
• Noise. It is loud during fast moves, despite the enclosure.
• Purge waste. Multi-colour prints with the AMS throw away a lot of filament on each colour change.
• Ecosystem. Bambu’s 2025 authorisation change applies here too; see the A1 review.

Against the alternatives

The Creality K1C is the closest enclosed rival and handles carbon-fibre filament from the box. If you are looking at a Prusa, the P1S is the equivalent we would buy on Amazon.