How the xTool X1 Fits Galvo Speed and Gantry Work Area into One Machine Using Monolithic Die-Casting and a Five-Source Optical Path

A girl entered the date and city of her first date into a generator. That day was the sixteenth day of the lunar month, and they were by the sea, where the moon was big and round.

The system retrieved real NASA moon-phase data and recreated what the moon looked like that night. She carved it out and made it into a moon lamp she could hold in her hands.

This moon cannot be found on any model website. Because it was a moon that belonged only to her.

This is also an interesting difference between laser engraving and 3D printing.

3D printing users hardly ever model anything themselves; they directly download existing models. Laser engraving users, by contrast, are used to finding material in their own lives: engraving a photo of their own dog on a mug, or carving their child's name into a backpack charm. One is picking from other people's works; the other is turning "oneself" into a work.

The difference is not only at the user level. Both categories are major segments among maker tools, yet the difference in technical difficulty is rarely mentioned, and the difficulty of laser engraving has long been seriously underestimated because of its "consumer-grade" appearance.

On October 29, xTool's X1 went on sale. Behind this machine stand mountain after mountain separating the two categories.

And behind this company stand a group of top-tier institutions including Tencent and Sequoia China.

But capital is only a ticket to entry. What truly makes xTool hard to replicate is the hard threshold hidden inside this machine. 01

A hard threshold underestimated by a consumer-grade appearance

Over the past few years, as the desktop manufacturing and maker tool market heated up, new players kept entering the laser engraving track, and quite a few maker companies originally deeply rooted in other categories began to cross over. But judging from market performance, these players still have not truly shaken the position of the leading brands in laser engraving.

Players have tried to find breakthroughs through price, power, processing precision, portability, or different groups such as female users, but the response has been lukewarm. Competition in the laser engraving track ultimately still comes back to a contest of underlying technical capability.

Among these, one technical problem that has plagued the industry for years is: how can laser engraving achieve both large format and speed?

Laser engraving machines usually have two approaches: "gantry" and "galvo." The gantry is like a big arm—it reaches far and has a large processing range, but it is not fast enough. The galvo is like a flexible wrist—its scanning speed is fast, but it can only process within a limited range.

In the past, the industry could often only choose one of the two: for large workpieces, choose the gantry; for speed, choose the galvo. If you wanted both, you usually had to buy two machines.

The difficulty lies in how to make these two systems work together in one machine—this is almost an industry-recognized hard problem.

As competition in the laser engraving machine industry becomes increasingly fierce, some players choose a follower strategy, while some players represented by xTool are exploring more new functions.

For a long time, there was no shortage of players trying to explore new solutions, but they either progressed slowly or failed in the end, and no successful solution appeared on the market. A person in industry R&D told Leiphone that many solutions work on paper but fail once put on a machine.

It was not until the xTool X1 appeared that the industry had a new solution.

The xTool X1 was officially initiated in July 2025. Its biggest breakthrough is that it seeks to be the first to fit the speed of a galvo and the format of a gantry into the same machine, and it has applied for a patent, with an extremely high technical threshold.

(Schematic diagram of the gantry + galvo four-axis linkage principle)

But after actually getting to work, the team found that the first trouble was not the algorithm, but vibration.

When the gantry and galvo work at the same time, the motion of the entire machine becomes more complex, and vibration is harder to control. "A deviation of 0.05 mm is half a light spot. If the structure starts vibrating first, all the algorithms behind it are useless," the project leader revealed.

So the challenge of the X1 moved one step forward from the algorithm and landed on the frame that carries this system.

Traditional frames are often made by combining multiple parts and connecting them with screws. Every joint is a link in the error chain—each part has its own tolerance, assembly adds another layer, and what finally reaches the laser head is a noticeable positional deviation.

The solution chosen by the X1 is a unibody die-cast structure, replacing about 268 screw connections and cutting off the error chain at the source.

Unibody die-casting is not cheap. For the frame alone, a single prototype costs about 100,000 yuan, and several prototypes have to be made. An industry insider put it plainly to Leiphone: "Ordinary small companies cannot afford it."

Beyond the frame, optical path design is another hurdle.

The X1 is equipped with five light sources: CO2, blue light, 30W fiber, MOPA, and ultraviolet. Adding light sources is not difficult in itself; what is difficult is making five very different kinds of light travel along the same flying optical path and finally land precisely on the same point. "Even an extremely tiny deviation may affect the entire system," a relevant person in charge of the X1 told Leiphone.

From the start of the project, the team redesigned the entire optical architecture, iterated through more than 50 versions of the optical path, completed thousands of calibration tests, and finally launched the Laser Swap solution, with the longest optical path at about 1.8 meters.

(Schematic diagram of the field lens principle for multi-light-source technology)

These technical investments ultimately point to a clear type of user.

Among users of laser engraving machines, small businesses account for a considerable proportion. For them, the equipment is a production tool and also an investment. Storefront workstations are limited, and procurement budgets are limited too. If processing different materials required buying a separate machine, the math would not work.

After more than a year of project R&D, xTool ultimately turned this solution into a product, aimed at entry-level small business users and positioned as "the first machine for doing business." 02

R&D always stays two steps ahead of competitors

In the 3D printing field, a single star model can often cover a fairly broad range of user needs. But in the laser engraving field, opening the product catalogs of leading brands often reveals multiple parallel product lines: some focus on large-format cutting, some pursue high-speed fine processing, and some are developed for specific materials and processes.

This reflects the different category characteristics of the two types of products. Mainstream desktop FDM 3D printing is forming a relatively convergent product form: companies can build around a relatively mature technical solution and, through iteration of parameters, configurations, and functions, cover a broad range of common needs. Laser engraving, however, is a non-convergent product category; differences in materials, light sources, motion systems, and processing methods make it difficult for a single product to satisfy different needs at the same time.

This means that competition in the laser engraving market is not just about who can make one product better, but also about who can advance multiple technical routes simultaneously and use different products to cover different needs.

xTool's product evolution is exactly like this. After entering the laser engraving field in 2021, xTool started from the gantry-style solution of the D series, gradually expanded to the galvanometer route of the F series, and then to products such as the S series and X1, continuously exploring different product forms. Behind each product expansion is not just adding a model, but solving a new set of technical problems.

In such a product category, R&D for a new product can hardly wait until the previous generation product is finished before starting. If work on key technologies began only after market demand became fully clear and the project was officially approved, the product development cycle could be stretched out. Therefore, xTool's R&D must not only advance products that have already been approved, but also judge technical directions in advance and conduct individual preliminary research for future products.

According to an industry insider, xTool usually first judges whether a key technology can bring practical benefits to a product, how difficult it is to overcome, and whether it fits future development directions. If it decides the investment is worthwhile, it starts individual preliminary research in advance, and only after the key technology gradually matures and meets the conditions for productization does it launch a full project.

The development of X1 is one example. Before the project was officially approved, some core algorithms and designs had already undergone about two years of individual preliminary research. Only when the key technologies could support the realization of functions at the target price did the project enter the overall development stage.

(Image shows xTool X1)

This approach changes the way R&D is advanced: different products do not necessarily unfold sequentially along the same timeline. While one product is still being developed, the key technologies needed for the next product may already have entered preliminary research; when one technical route enters the productization stage, other routes may also be explored in parallel.

Legend has it that inside xTool, from top to bottom, everyone believes in one rule: in martial arts, speed is the only undefeated skill.

To maintain its current leading position, xTool's core strategy is "speed": "product iteration must be two steps faster than other competitors, ensuring that after competitors develop and launch a product, xTool immediately launches a new product."

What the outside world sees is xTool's continuously expanding product portfolio and the steady stream of new products. What is easy to overlook is that these products are not lined up and developed one after another only after the previous one's R&D is finished.

xTool's "speed" is not only about fast iteration of a single product, but also about being able to push multiple product projects and multiple technical directions forward at the same time.

This also constitutes an important difference between xTool and ordinary maker companies. A maker company can achieve a breakthrough in a certain technology or a certain product, but to continuously switch between different technical routes and advance multiple product lines at the same time still requires R&D strength formed through long-term accumulation.

It is precisely the non-convergent particularity of the laser engraving category that forces xTool to repeatedly solve problems within complex technology combinations and gradually develop the ability to conduct parallel R&D across multiple products and multiple threads. This further explains why xTool was able to rapidly rise to the top of the laser engraving machine market in just a few years. Third-party platform indices show that the popularity of the laser engraving category is very high, and xTool's popularity is far higher than the industry's popularity, something not seen in other categories.

This "speed" also extends to software R&D.

After entering the laser engraving field, xTool quickly formed a dedicated team to develop Atomm and Studio in-house: the former focuses on creative discovery, AI design, and community content, while the latter handles device connection, parameter settings, and processing execution.

It is understood that at first not everyone understood this, believing that a hardware company could simply adopt a third-party software suite.

However, this strategy quickly paid off.

Users discover inspiration in Atomm, obtain or generate designs, and send them to Studio with one click to complete processing—the barrier to use is lowered, generating a large amount of data. This data accumulates and in turn feeds back into AI tools, forming a flywheel that is spinning at high speed.

According to xTool's official introduction, Atomm, as the world's first laser engraving creation platform, has accumulated about 120,000 models, more than 20,000 creators, and over 100,000 cases. At the same time, the number of times users use AI generation has grown from seven or eight times a month last year to hundreds of times—in one year, AI in laser engraving has gone from novelty to daily routine.

Laser engraving involves highly complex materials and application scenarios, making data accumulation especially important.

For the same pattern, switching to wood, leather, acrylic, or even cookies and cakes may require different power, speed, and processing methods. In the past, users often had to go through repeated trial and error to find suitable parameters.

xTool reduces this cost through AI parameter recommendations. It is reported that the platform's actual monthly processing volume has grown from tens of thousands of times to about 1 million times, with the materials and application scenarios covered increasing accordingly.

When faced with unknown materials, getting AI to dare to give a parameter is much harder than imagined. According to xTool's software product manager, this matter is "very, very difficult, and currently the only company in the industry trying to solve this problem is us."

With the increase in light sources on the X1, the range of processable materials has greatly increased, and the direct result is a rapid expansion of the parameter space: each intersection of a light source and a material forms a set of processing parameters, involving power, speed, frequency, and defocus amount. And with one more light source, this matrix has to be rerun.

Other laser engraving manufacturers speak highly of xTool's software and admire its willingness to invest: "Most of us come from industrial backgrounds, focusing on hardware while being weaker in software—deciding to invest in software is much harder than imagined." 03

From laser leader to desktop creation ecosystem

In the laser engraving track, the positioning of competitors has become increasingly clear.

According to the prospectus, xTool's market share in laser engraving and cutting in 2025 has already exceeded the sum of the second through tenth place.

This share advantage is also translating into industry influence at the product level.

An investor said that many players in the industry today have already begun looking at xTool's products to determine direction.

As a company that has already reached the top of a segmented track, xTool is no longer satisfied with a single vertical market.

Laser engraving machines need to handle different materials and different creative needs. Through long-term accumulation, xTool has developed the ability to develop products for segmented scenarios, and this ability was later transferred to new categories such as printers.

Being able to hit user needs across categories relies not on some founder's strategic intuition, but on a user feedback mechanism that runs through the entire company—at xTool, user insight has never been the dedicated work of a single department; even the boss personally steps in to keep an eye on users' real pain points.

A person close to the company revealed that xTool's R&D room is equipped with multiple large screens that scroll and display users' criticism and pain points about products, with the aim of letting all R&D staff know that "the product should not be complacent, and there are still many problems to solve." The boss will also directly press R&D staff: "How do you plan to solve this problem? How quickly can it be solved?" For P0-level issues, the team can achieve "discovered in the morning, launched in the afternoon."

xTool's entry standard is also very clear: to enter a new track, it must deliver sufficiently good innovation. Without good user insight and without making products clearly superior to competitors, merely following the industry in competing on cost and price, the boss is not willing to enter lightly.

Over the past few years, xTool's product expansion has unfolded along this logic.

In 2025, xTool began entering the printing field, first launching a desktop-level DTF garment printer, and then in 2026 launching the O1 all-material printer, continuously expanding its product boundaries. Both new products received preliminary market validation—on the first day the O1 went online, official website sales were about 100 million yuan, and sales in the first month of pre-sale reached 70 million US dollars.

(Image shows xTool O1)

Similar to laser engraving machines, these new products mainly target small and medium-sized B-end customers, such as studios and independent designers, mainly serving as production tools for small workshops to do business. Playability and customizability will be higher, approaching a product comparable to industrial grade.

These new products have already released positive signals, showing that xTool's growth does not have to rely entirely on laser engraving machines.

According to people familiar with the matter, xTool generally maintains 5-6 new product launches per year. In 2026, xTool has already launched 7 new products, covering categories such as heat press equipment, UV printers, laser engraving machines, and cutting machines. As of the first half of the year, xTool's overall revenue has achieved nearly double growth.

Once a product achieves a breakthrough, the ecosystem becomes the "next big test" for a hardware company.

For example, xTool's UV printer and laser engraving machine share the same software system, so users can print first, then engrave or cut, without having to repeatedly calibrate between different software.

Similar combinations also appear between embroidery and printing: first use an embroidery machine to create a pattern, then use the O1 to color the pattern, connecting processes that originally required different tools. A single device solves one need, while multiple devices combined can complete more complex creative tasks.

A practitioner familiar with this track commented that xTool "does a relatively complete job overall, from devices to software to content."

For large companies like xTool that have already broken through, systemic advantages will become increasingly obvious. It has already proven that it has the ability to make a segmented market that was once not favored into a big one. Next, the market will test whether xTool can create another such growth point. 04

Conclusion

Looking back at the path xTool has traveled: from starting out in laser engraving, to combining printing, embroidery, knife cutting, and other devices into a complete creative workflow, and then to long-term investment in software, community, and content—it is no longer just a laser engraving company, but is turning desktop creation tools into an entire ecosystem.

This expansion is also reshaping the industry itself. Desktop manufacturing is moving from a single category toward mutual penetration: 3D printing players are entering laser engraving, while laser engraving's xTool has stepped into printing; everyone is extending their reach into adjacent categories. The era of a single category is passing, and future competition will test who can truly connect devices, software, and content into a whole.

Today, new players are still rushing into the laser engraving track, including many "masters" who have already achieved a lot in other fields.

For latecomers, imitating a product may not be difficult; what is difficult is catching up on capabilities that require time to accumulate, such as user insight, parameter accumulation, and software ecosystem. Behind these capabilities, there is also an easier-to-overlook factor: whether a company can simultaneously advance multiple technology routes and product R&D, and continuously transform technological accumulation into new products.

In this sense, xTool is not only a desktop creation tool company, but also a technology-driven "fast company" driven by multi-threaded R&D. This may be what is truly difficult to replicate about xTool. ▼ Recommended Reading ▼

The first year of desktop CNC: capital is scrambling for "Little Bambu," is five-axis a trend or a false proposition?