E-steps tell the printer how far to turn the extruder motor to push one millimetre of filament. If they are wrong, every print is slightly starved or over-fed. This works out the exact correction from one measurement.
How to use it
- Heat the hotend to printing temperature so filament flows freely.
- Mark the filament 100mm above the extruder inlet.
- Command a slow 100mm extrude, then measure the distance from inlet to your mark.
- Enter your current E-steps, the length requested (100mm) and the length actually extruded.
- The tool gives the corrected E-steps. Save it with M92 and M500.
What it does
One measurement, exact answer
No trial and error. Measure once, get the corrected number, save it, done.
The gcode to save it
It reminds you of the M92 and M500 commands so the value survives a power cycle.
Works on any extruder
Bowden or direct, geared or not: the calculation is the same, because it is measuring your actual result.
What people use it for
A new printer or extruder
Fresh machine, or you just fitted a new extruder. Calibrate E-steps before anything else, and every later tuning step starts from solid ground.
Chasing gaps or blobs
Consistent under or over-extrusion across every filament usually means E-steps, not flow. Fix the root cause here.
After a hardware change
New drive gear or a different extruder ratio changes E-steps. Recalibrate and move on.
Good to know
- Extrude slowly during the test (around 1 to 2mm per second) so the motor is not skipping under load and skewing the reading.
- Measure from the same reference point you marked from. A few millimetres of error here is a few percent of error in the result.
- Do E-steps at printing temperature, not cold: cold filament resists and the reading will be off.
- After E-steps, calibrate flow per filament with a single-wall test, then leave E-steps alone.
Questions
How do I calibrate E-steps?
Heat the hotend, mark 100mm up the filament from the extruder inlet, tell the printer to extrude 100mm slowly, then measure what is left to the mark. Enter your current E-steps, the 100mm you asked for, and the amount actually extruded.
What is the formula?
New E-steps equals current E-steps times the requested length divided by the length actually extruded. If you asked for 100mm and got 96mm, you were under-extruding and the number goes up.
How do I save the new value?
Send M92 E followed by the new number, then M500 to save it to the printer's memory. On printers with a UI, there is usually a motion or calibration menu that does the same.
Should I calibrate E-steps or flow?
E-steps first, once, per printer: it makes the extruder move filament accurately. Then flow (extrusion multiplier) per filament, to fine-tune how much lands on the part. They are two different dials, done in that order.
Also called
Known as an E-steps calculator, extruder calibration calculator, steps per millimetre tool, or M92 calculator. It corrects how much filament your extruder actually moves.