How to Design Your Own Cellphone Cover For 3D Printing (and Mass Produce Them to Sell If You Want To)

Let’s just start off by saying that designing the world’s most unique, personalized phone case doesn’t have to be hard. In fact, utilizing other people’s skills, experience and equipment, literally all you need to provide to get started is a pen or pencil sketch, with some basic dimensions, colors if you want and you can iterate from there through all the different design processes needed to make the phone case of your dreams.

It also makes it much easier if you use a company that can provide assistance through the design and prototyping process (you might stop there if you only need one for yourself), all the way through to mold making and manufacturing if you’re thinking of selling your products enmasse.

This is a much easier, quicker and more painless way of designing and manufacturing a phone case than if you try and learn how to do everything yourself, or if you try to cobble together professionals from different fields who may not work well together, or fully understand what has occurred in the design and production process so far.

Why Would You Want to Design Your Own Phone Case?

There are lots of reasons someone may want to design their own phone case. Maybe you just want to impress your friends by having the coolest phone case ever.

While there are plenty of interesting cellphone cases on Etsy to choose from, maybe you want a case that no-one else in the world has, or you want to personalize a case in a similar way to monogramming clothing, except in this instance you’d make the whole cellphone case your own.

Maybe you want to create something unique for yourself or the market that no-one else has thought of yet, say for instance an every day carry case that also has a utility tool built into it (oh sorry, that’s been done already. Also, check out the cases with inbuilt bottle opener, fidget spinner or vanity lights at the same link).

Or maybe you’ve just seen a good business idea you can capitalize on by creating a case for an up and coming trend. Obviously, you would need to ensure you have the appropriate rights to do that, creating a Stars Wars themed case is likely to get you into trouble if you’re not George Lucas for instance (and if you are George Lucas, we can’t wait to talk to you!)

How to Design a Unique Cellphone Case

Designer the Perfect Phone Holder / Protector If It’s Just For You

If the case is just for you, the process can be a bit quicker, a fair bit cheaper and unless you have special needs in terms of materials that can’t be 3D printed, we would recommend that your case is 3D printed. We can 3D print in a wide range of materials and finishes. This is what we do for prototyping products that are going to go into mass production, so that our clients can see and feel their designs before signing off. Basically this allows them to pick up on any mistakes before moving into the more costly mold making and mass production parts of the process.

Because you only need one case however, 3D printing is going to be your most cost-effective option for getting your design produced.

Before that can happen however, we need a design to 3D print from. If you know a bit about 3D design and can give us an .STL file ready to print that’s great. For most people however, it will be much quicker and more wallet-friendly to get us to do the design for you. In fact, a 3D CAD design produced by our experts is much cheaper than purchasing 3D rendering software and the computer to run it, let alone the time it will take you to learn how to use the software as well.

Just give us a sketch of your design, along with any notes or similar examples – we’re really good and getting that design off the paper and into three dimensional reality.

Designing a Smartphone Case For Mass Production

If you want to sell your phone cases, the next step after 3D printing a prototype is creating a mold. This is typically the most expensive part of the process – once your mold is created your cost per part for each phone case will be very low.

Before we can make a mold for you, you’ll need to choose what sort of material you would like your case made out of.

The pages on our site on plastic injection molding, silicone injection molding and foam injection molding can help you decide and give you some ideas, or help you understand how much is a custom silicone mold when having one made. You can also 3D print phone covers. How much do 3D printing services near me cost? They can actually be pretty affordable.

The quickest way to find out what will work best is likely going to be to call us on 1.888.202.2052. That way we can quickly understand what you’re aiming for, and make suggestions on the best product to fit your budget and goals.

Once a mold is made and we’ve sent you an initial sample, then we go to work producing your cellphone cases at scale. They can be manufactured locally, or offshore depending on your budget and preferences.

Then after that it won’t be too long until they’re in your hands and ready to get out to the market!

If you’re thinking about designing your own phone cases, give us a call, send us an email through our enquiry form, or use the live chat on this site and let’s talking about your project and how we might be able to help you through the different stages of the process. We look forward to speaking with you.