This is because of the fact that powder bed alone is not sufficient enough to hold the liquid phase of the metal that is created when laser is scanning the powder. Support structures are also required to restrict curling/warping of the melted powder due to high-temperature gradients. The overhangs having angles less than 45 degrees should be avoided if possible at the design stage. The main advantage of this is to reduce material usage and the post processing requirement of removing support structures from the designed components. The total number of layers required to build the whole part is directly proportional to the height of the part measured along the build direction. Every layer of the part to be printed requires tightly laying compacted thin layer of powdered material using roller, tracing of laser according to the 3D data fed to the machine in the horizontal plane and incremental lowering of powder bed for the successive layer to be laid. These processes require a significant amount of time thus redesigning the product for smaller heights may save manufacturing time greatly. The build orientation should be such that the height of the part should be least along the build direction. The main direction of heat flow which is generated by the laser at the top is along the build direction due to the fact that powder bed lying at the bottom is the major heat sink. The layered addition of material and the directional heat flow in DMLS lead to the growing of microstructural grains along the build direction leading to anisotropic properties. The structure printed through DMLS has weaker properties along the build direction. This anisotropy can be removed using heat treatment methods but they are highly energy intensive and costly processes. Hence, it is advisable to consider the anisotropy in the very beginning of designing such structural parts and the direction of largest stress in the structure should lie in the horizontal plane. Being an additive manufacturing technique, DMLS doesn’t incur any extra cost for the complexity of the part. The build volume along with the number of layers is what determines the production cost and time. DMLS eliminates the need for tool production however such technologies are impervious to economies of scale. Therefore, it is recommended to design parts with least amount of superfluous volumes, building only the relevant geometries. Furthermore the parts should be designed to avoid assembly requirements because printing sub-assembly with intricate geometries is now possible.