Overview

Research from Businesswire – a Berkshire Hathaway company – reports that the global textile printing market will reach 28.2 billion square meters by 2026, while the data in 2020 was only estimated at 22 billion, which means that there’s still room for at least 27% growth in the following years.
The growth in the textile printing market is mainly driven by rising disposable incomes, so the consumers especially in emerging countries are gaining the ability to afford fashionable clothes with attractive designs and designer wear. As long as the demand for clothing continues to grow and the requirements become higher, the textile printing industry will keep thriving, resulting in stronger demand for textile printing technologies. Now the market share of textile printing is mainly occupied by screen printing, sublimation printing, DTG printing, and DTF printing.

DTF Printing

DTF printing (direct to film printing) is the latest printing method among all methods introduced.
This printing method is so new that there’s no record of its development history yet. Although DTF printing is a newcomer in the textile printing industry, it’s taking the industry by storm. More and more business owners are adopting this new method to expand their business and achieve growth due to its simplicity, convenience, and superior print quality.
To perform DTF printing, some machines or parts are essential to the whole process. They are a DTF printer, software, hot-melt adhesive powder, DTF transfer film, DTF inks, automatic powder shaker (optional), oven, and heat press machine.
Before executing DTF printing, you should prepare your designs and set the printing software parameters. The software acts as an integral part of the DTF printing for the reason that it will ultimately influence the print quality by controlling critical factors such as the ink volume and ink drop sizes, color profiles, etc.
Unlike DTG printing, DTF printing utilizes DTF inks, which are special pigments created in cyan, yellow, magenta, and black colors, to print directly to the film. You need white ink to build up the foundation of your design and other colors to print the detailed designs. And the films are specially designed to make them easy to transfer. They usually come in sheets form (for small batch orders) or roll form (for bulk orders).
The hot-melt adhesive powder is then applied to the design and shook off. Some will use an automatic powder shaker to improve efficiency, but some will just shake the powder manually. The powder work as an adhesive material to bind the design to the garment. Next, the film with hot-melt adhesive powder is placed in the oven to melt the powder so that the design on the film can be transferred to the garment under the functioning of the heat press machine.

Pros

More Durable
Designs created by DTF printing are more durable because they are scratch-resistant, oxidation/water-resistant, high elastic, and not easy to deform or fade. 
Wider Choices on Garment Materials and Colors
DTG printing, sublimation printing, and screen printing have garment materials, garment colors, or ink color restrictions. While DTF printing can break these limitations and is suitable for printing on all garment materials of any color.
More Flexible Inventory Management
DTF printing allows you to print on the film first and then you can just store the film, which means that you don’t have to transfer the design onto the garment first. The printed film can be stored for a long time and can still be transferred perfectly when needed. You can manage your inventory more flexibly with this method. 
Huge Upgrade Potential
There are machines like roll feeders and automatic powder shakers that help to upgrade the automation and production efficiency greatly. These are all optional if your budget is limited in the early stage of business.

Cons

The Printed Design is More Noticeable
The designs transferred with DTF film are more noticeable because they have firmly adhered to the surface of the garment, you can feel the pattern if you touch the surface
More Kinds of Consumables Needed
DTF films, DTF inks, and hot-melt powder are all necessary for DTF printing, which means that you need to pay more attention to remaining consumables and cost control.
Films are not Recyclable
The films are single-use only, they become useless after transferring. If your business thrives, the more film you consume, the more waste you generate.

Why DTF Printing?

Suitable for Individuals or Small and Medium-Sized Businesses

DTF printers are more affordable for startups and small businesses. And there are still possibilities to upgrade their capacity to mass production level by combining the automatic powder shaker. With a suitable combination, the printing process can not only be optimized as much as possible and thus improve bulk order digestibility.

A Brand Building Helper

More and more personal sellers are adopting DTF printing as their next business growth point for the reason that DTF printing is convenient and easy for them to operate and the print effect is satisfactory considering there’s less time needed to complete the whole process. Some sellers even share how they build their clothing brand with DTF printing step by step on Youtube. Indeed, DTF printing is especially suitable for small business to build their own brands since it offers you wider and more flexible choices no matter the garment materials and colors, inks colors, and stock management.

Significant Advantages over Other Printing Methods

The advantages of DTF printing are very significant as illustrated above. No pretreatment is required, faster printing process, chances to improve stock versatility, more garments available for printing, and exceptional print quality, these advantages are enough to show its merits over other methods, but these are just a portion of all the benefits of DTF printing, its advantages are still counting.