Creality SPARKX i8 Promises Four Colors Through One Nozzle, But the Price Is Still Missing

Creality announced the SPARKX i8 on August 19, 2026. The new printer is the company's fourth multi-color product since January, and the one that matters most for buyers who want four-color output without the mechanical complexity of a toolchanger.

The key change is inside the printhead. Creality calls it QuarTeks. Four filament channels run separately to the hotend and merge 1.7 mm from the nozzle. The company says a color change takes under a second. That is really a matter of shortening the shared path between the extruder and the nozzle. In an AMS-style system, the old color has to travel through a long tube before the new one appears clean. QuarTeks collapses that distance.

Everything else is inherited from the SPARKX i7. Same 260 x 260 x 255 mm build volume. Same 500 mm/s top speed. Same 81-point auto leveling. Same PEI plate. The i8 adds 0.6 kg of weight, likely from the new printhead assembly.

The launch claims need context. Creality's chart shows the i8 finishing a multicolor print in 14 hours 41 minutes. A four-toolhead changer took 18 hours 24 minutes. A four-color bed slinger took 90 hours 41 minutes. The 5x faster headline never says what it beats. The actual gain ranges from 1.25x against a four-toolhead changer to 6.2x against a bed slinger. Those are very different comparisons.

Zero grams of waste is another claim that deserves scrutiny. The purge material goes into the model's infill, and only on select models. That is not zero waste in any general sense. It is waste that disappears inside the part. If the infill is sparse or the color changes are frequent, that can work. If the model is mostly solid or the changes are scattered, the waste is still there, just hidden.

The i7 launched at $339 for early backers in January. The Combo now sells for $359. Seven months of waiting saved those backers about 6 percent. There is no price for the i8 yet. The teaser page collects email addresses for early-bird access and names no crowdfunding platform, no ship date, and no retailer. A reasonable guess is a price at or slightly above the i7 Combo, since the i8 integrates the color hardware into the toolhead and drops the need for an external CFS unit.

Creality is now selling four different approaches to multicolor: the KliTek nozzle changer, the CFS Lite external feeder, the CFS Nano compact rack, and now QuarTeks inside the toolhead. The i7 Nano and i7 Combo are already on the market. The i8 is the next step, but it is still a step buyers have to wait for.