Understanding Injection Mold Tooling Costs

Injection mold tooling represents a significant upfront investment in plastic part manufacturing. The cost of an injection mold typically ranges from $3,000 for simple prototype molds to over $100,000 for complex multi-cavity production tools. Key cost factors include the projected mold area (part footprint), core depth, undercut complexity requiring side-actions or lifters, number of cavities for production volume, steel grade determining mold longevity (P20 for 500K shots, H13 for 1M+ shots), and runner system type (cold runner vs. hot runner manifolds).