xTool F1 Ultra Review: Two Lasers in One Box

The xTool F1 Ultra answers a specific frustration: metal markers cannot cut wood, and wood lasers cannot mark bare steel, so a shop that sells both ends up owning two machines. The F1 Ultra puts a fiber source and a diode source in one portable galvo box, letting the same unit letter a stainless tumbler and then engrave a walnut coaster without a swap.

We score by class, standardizing published specs against owner reports and community-shared results rather than running a lab. Here is what the dual-source design buys you, and what it does not.

Verdict up front

The F1 Ultra is the most versatile portable laser most makers can buy, and the strongest fit for a mixed metal-and-wood catalog. It is fast, small enough to sit on a desk, and covers more materials than any single-source machine near its price of roughly $2,000 to $2,500 (current as of mid-2026). It is a skip if you only need one material family — a plain diode or a dedicated fiber does that one job for less — or if full-color metal marking is the business, which is MOPA territory.

For a lighter-duty, lower-cost entry into the same portable line, the single-source xTool F1 covers one-source work at a friendlier price. Check the F1 on Amazon.

The specs that actually matter

• Dual source: a fiber laser at 1064 nm for bare metal, plus a blue diode for wood, leather, and painted or coated surfaces — selectable in software, no hardware swap.
• Galvo optics: mirror-steered galvanometer scanning with an F-theta lens, so marking speeds run into the thousands of mm/s. This is a marking-and-light-cutting machine, not a big-bed sheet cutter.
• Compact field: a small square work area typical of galvo machines; a slide extension and rotary widen what fits, including cylinders and longer stock.
• Portable and enclosed enough for desk use, with framing and autofocus to speed setup.
• Software: xTool Creative Space, tuned for the dual-source workflow.

The fiber side is where the F1 Ultra earns its keep. A 1064 nm beam is absorbed by bare metal, so it engraves and anneals stainless steel, brass, aluminum, and titanium that a CO2 or diode can only mark if the metal is coated. The diode side then handles the organic materials fiber is poor at. One machine, two physics problems solved.

What it does well

Speed and range. Galvo marking is fast enough that a tray of stainless keychains becomes a quick batch rather than an afternoon, and the fiber holds crisp detail for logos, QR codes, and serial numbers. Switch to the diode and the same unit engraves wood tags, leather patches, and anodized aluminum cards — the latter marking bright white without removing material.

For a seller, the value is not owning two machines, two footprints, and two software habits. A jewelry maker can mark a steel pendant and engrave its wood display card on one desk. A pet-tag shop can cut and letter without a second purchase. That consolidation is the real product.

Materials, settings, and safety

Fiber unlocks the metals: bare and coated stainless, brass, aluminum, and titanium for engraving and annealing. The diode adds wood, leather, cork, slate, and painted or coated metal. Between them the F1 Ultra covers most of what a mixed shop sells — but the material law does not bend. Never mark PVC, vinyl, or any chlorinated plastic; the fiber's intensity makes fumes worse, not safer, and chlorine gas ruins both optics and lungs.

Metal marking produces fine particulate you do not want to breathe, and diode work on wood produces smoke. Run extraction on both — a desktop fume extractor at minimum — wear eye protection rated for the wavelength in use, and never run a job unattended. Galvo speed means a mistake happens fast, so prove settings with a small test grid and pull starting points from our settings calculator before committing a full tray.

Starting settings and dial-in

Dual-source means two settings languages. On the fiber side, bare stainless takes a crisp black mark around 40 to 60% power near 1,000 mm/s, with frequency in the tens of kHz; annealed marks want slower speeds and tighter line spacing so the heat builds. On the diode side you are back in wood-and-leather territory: veg-tan leather engraves light and fast, around 15% power at high speed, while wood cutting drops to a slow, multi-pass crawl. The two sources share a frame but not a chart.

Because galvo work happens fast, a wrong setting ruins a blank before you can react, so we bracket rather than guess. Pull fiber and diode starting points from our settings calculator, copy the range, and burn a small test grid on scrap of the exact alloy or board you are running — stainless from two suppliers can mark differently enough to matter.

The business math

Dual-source pays when your catalog spans material families. If you already sell both metal and wood goods, the F1 Ultra replaces two machines and the desk space, service, and learning curve of each. Marking a batch of steel tags at a few dollars of blank cost and selling them personalized at $12 to $18 is high-margin work, and the diode side keeps the wood line running on the same footprint.

It does not pay if you only sell one material family. A wood-only shop is overspending on a fiber it rarely fires; a metal-only shop is paying for a diode it ignores — and should read our fiber vs CO2 for metal guide first. Weigh it against a true color-capable MOPA in our F1 Ultra vs ComMarker B6 comparison, and decide whether the step up to the F2 Ultra is worth it. Our buying guides map the whole field.

Who it's for

Buy the F1 Ultra if your catalog genuinely spans metal and wood and you would otherwise own two machines — the consolidation onto one desk, one software habit, and one service line is the real value. Pass if you live in a single material family, or if repeatable color metal is the goal: that is a MOPA decision, and the F2 Ultra or a dedicated MOPA is the honest buy.