Creality
| Basic information | |
|---|---|
| Founded | 2014 |
| Legal Structure | Private |
| Industry | Technology |
| Also known as | |
| Official website | https://www.creality.com/ |
Creality is a Chinese technology company headquartered in Shenzhen which manufactures 3D printers and 3D scanners[1]
Consumer impact summary
[edit | edit source]- User freedom: Creality silently disabled the root access toggle for K1 series printers, making root access unavailable without using a computer. Creality forced an update to their Creality Scan smartphone app for their 3D scanners that removes the ability to plug the scanner into a phone to use features such as scanning with a phone link without a $369 to $459 USD Creality Scan Bridge.
- Business model: Creality sells 3D printers and scanners. Creality has also paywalled features on their 3D scanners, requiring a $250 to $300 USD Creality Scan Bridge.
- Market control: Creality has extensive competition, with other 3D printer brands such as Bambu Lab, Prusa Research, and Ultimaker.
Incidents
[edit | edit source]This is a list of all consumer-protection incidents this company is involved in. Any incidents not mentioned here can be found in the Creality category.
Creality disables root access toggle on K1 series 3D printers
[edit | edit source]Creality silently disabled the ability to root 3D printers which were advertised as having a toggle to gain root access to them.[2] Creality does not disclose this on their product page, despite nearly every review citing this as a feature. Creality also will not provide support for root-related failures.
There is currently a community bash script that exposes SSH and root access[2], but doesn't have much use due to being incompatible with Klipper packages as of now.[citation needed]
Models affected:
Creality K2 series firmware GPLv3 violation
[edit | edit source]- Main article: Creality K2 series GPLv3 violation
The firmware for Creality's K2 series 3D printers (K2 SE, K2, K2 Pro, and K2 Plus) ships proprietary modules compiled with Cython into the GPLv3-licensed Klipper host environment without releasing the corresponding source code.[4][5] Klipper's community developers and the independent fake-name/cfs-reverse-engineering project have documented these closed binaries as a violation of the GNU General Public License v3, the license under which Klipper is distributed.[4][5] Creality opened a public GitHub repository for the K2 line in December 2025 and markets it as open source, but the published code lacks the source for several hardware communication modules.[6]
In May 2026, a requester pressed Creality for the complete GPLv3 source code and copied the Software Freedom Conservancy and the Free Software Foundation on the demand. Creality support replied that it was unable to directly provide the corresponding source code and gave no compliance timeline.[7]
Creality forces update that removes features from their 3D scanners
[edit | edit source]Creality's 3D scanners (Otter, Ferret, Raptor, RaptorX) were advertised that they would feature the ability to scan with a wired connection to a phone. Creality added this feature, but later forced an update to the Creality Scan smartphone app that locked access to the previously available features such as scanning with a phone link from their 3D scanners behind a paywall by requiring users to buy the Creality Scan Bridge, a proprietary device which costs $369 to $459 USD[8][9]. The update is forced by updating the software as soon as the user has a stable internet connection and opens the Creality Scan 4 software. There is no option to opt-out, only the chance to install the update. Creality's reasoning for this update was that scanning with a USB cable could overload the phone's motherboard and reduce the battery life overtime.[10]
See also
[edit | edit source]References
[edit | edit source]- ↑ "Scanners". Creality. Archived from the original on 2026-01-29. Retrieved 2026-02-05.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Wiki for Creality Helper Script". Wiki for Creality Helper Script. Retrieved 2026-03-26.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ↑ 3.0 3.1 "Root Disclaimer and Risk Warning". Creality Wiki. Archived from the original on 2026-01-31. Retrieved 2026-04-28.
K1 series 2025 models (such as: K1 C 2025 & K1 Max 2025) do not support Root access
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 "Where are the (required to be released) sources for Creality's modifications to Klipper the K2". Creality Forum. Retrieved 2026-06-02.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 "fake-name/cfs-reverse-engineering". GitHub. Retrieved 2026-06-02.
- ↑ "Creality Open-Source 3D Printer Firmware is Here!". Creality Forum. Retrieved 2026-06-02.
- ↑ "Creality K2 GPLv3 Compliance Demand Correspondence Logs (May 2026)". Internet Archive. Retrieved 2026-06-02.
- ↑ "Creality Scan Bridge for CR-Scan Otter 3D Scanner, Wireless Scanning Kit for iPhone, Android and Mirror Screen". Amazon.com. Retrieved 2026-05-03.
- ↑ "Creality Scan Bridge for Raptor, Raptor Pro and Sermoon S1 3D Scanner, Wireless Scanning Kit for iPhone, Android and Mirror Screen for Windows, Mac". Amazon.com. Retrieved 2026-05-03.
- ↑ "CR-Scan Otter FAQ and Troubleshooting". Creality Wiki. Archived from the original on 2026-02-11. Retrieved 2026-02-11.
This could overload your phone's motherboard and seriously reduce battery life over time.