Abstract Purpose To investigate the translucency of the new 3D‐printable materials concerning thickness and the color masking ability of each material against different substrate colors. Materials and Methods Ninety square‐shaped specimens (12.0 mm × 12.0 mm) of two new 3D‐printable materials: ceramic‐infiltrated hybrid resin composite (VS) and light‐polymerizing resin (FX), and a control group, lithium disilicate (LS), were fabricated at three different thicknesses (1.0, 2.0, and 3.0 mm). Ten samples ( n = 10) were fabricated per material‐thickness combination. Three substrates (12.0 mm × 12.0 mm × 2.0 mm) were digitally designed and milled from cobalt‐chromium (Co‐Cr) alloy (silver color), noble alloy (gold color), and zirconia (tooth color). The color parameters L *, a *, and b * in the CIELab color space of all specimens were measured, and the translucency parameters (TP 00 ) were calculated with the CIEDE2000 formula. Color differences (dE 00 ) of each material at three different thicknesses against three different substrates were measured and calculated with the CIEDE2000 formula. The influence of material type and thickness on TP 00 was analyzed using two‐way analysis of variance (ANOVA), and color differences (dE00) were evaluated with three‐way ANOVA for material, substrate, and thickness, with additional two‐way ANOVAs for pairwise substrate comparisons; one‐sided one‐sample t ‐tests tested dE00 against the perceptibility (PT = 1.0) and acceptability (AT = 2.7) thresholds, and Fisher's protected least significant difference test was used for pairwise comparisons ( α = 0.05). Results Increasing sample thickness resulted in reduced translucency for all materials. Interactions between sample thickness and materials impacted both translucency and color masking ability. One‐millimeter LS samples demonstrated the highest translucency (and lowest color masking ability), while 1.0 and 2.0 mm samples of VS and FX, and 2.0 mm samples of LS, exhibited similar translucency. The greatest change in color masking ability was observed when the thickness was increased from 1.0 to 3.0 mm for all materials. For LS against the zirconia substrate, the most substantial change occurred between 1.0 and 2.0 mm. In general, against the zirconia and gold alloy substrates, color masking was optimized at 2.0 mm, although a gradual and less pronounced increase continued up to 3.0 mm. A more consistent stepwise increase in color masking ability was observed for all materials as sample thickness increased from 1.0 to 2.0 mm and then to 3.0 mm against the Co‐Cr substrate. Conclusions LS may be superior and represent the material of choice clinically when esthetics is the primary concern, when compared to the new 3D‐printable materials. Each material tested demonstrated the potential to achieve desirable translucency and effective masking, dependent upon both material thickness and the underlying substrate. Clinical decisions regarding the utilization of these materials should be guided by specific requirements of each restoration, with careful consideration of both mechanical and esthetic properties.
Wang et al. (Mon,) studied this question.