With the rising demand of PCBs in electronic devices and advanced technology there is a rise in PCB manufacturers all over the world. Today one such PCB manufacturer with world over presence will be unwrapped and analysed in detail is JLCPCB. 

About the Manufacturer: 

JLCPCB (JiaLiChuang (HongKong) Co., Limited) was founded in 2006 and is headquartered at HongKong. With over 15 years of experience they specialise in quick PCB prototype and small-batch PCB production, making them leading PCB manufacturer worldover. 

Their customer base is more than 800,000 and per day online order capacity for PCB prototypes and small quantities is more than 20,000. 

Key Highlights:

• Instant Quote: Using their platform you can directly check price comparisons without even registering to their platform.
• Single Unit PCB can be Ordered: As low as one PCB can also be ordered using their platform.
• Upto 20 layers PCB: High precision PCBs upto 20 layers can be ordered via JLCPCB, which is pretty advanced and not easily available. 
• Very Economic: The pricing for small units and simple products is extremely pocket friendly. This is of great advantage for hobbyists, researchers and individuals.

• Sponsorship: There are various sponsorship programmes and new customer offers that the platform provides for its users. 
• High Specifications: The customer has many options to make their PCB highly customisable. A range of varied base materials, solder masks and dimensions are available. Further, an option is provided to choose whether the PCB will be used for industrial, aerospace or medical purposes. 
• Assembly Parts Library: JLCPCB has 350+ in stock components of a wide range and are ready to deliver in 24 hours. The Various components available are:

Array of Customers:

Being an internationally established manufacturing platform, JLCPCB has many arrays of customers ranging from individuals to industries. 

Various customers include:

Capabilities Compass:

Standard and Advanced PCB Manufacturing:

Highly precise PCB manufacturing takes place in JLCPCB. Upto 20 layers PCB can be manufactured. 

Apart from FR-4, Aluminium and Copper core boards are also available. 

They also provide BGA, Legend, Board Outlines and PCB Panelization options for the users. 

PCB Assembly:

JLCPCB offers two variations for assembly: economic and standard.

Both SMT and Thru-hole options are available. While for economic Upto 50 pcs can be ordered, using standard assembly, you can order as many as 80,000 pcs.

Both Visual and X-ray inspection are carried out on assembled PCB. 

An economic assembly takes at most 3 days while standard takes more than 4 days to complete the assembly. 

SMT-Stencil:

JLCPCB offers both NON-FRAMEWORK (or frameless) and FRAMEWORK stencils. 

A frameless stencil is cheaper and lighter in weight. 

You can either order a stencil along with the PCB board as laser stencil or custom-size frameless stencil, or you can also separately quote for the stencil. 

3D Printing: 

Apart from PCB manufacturing, 3D printing is also available with an instant quote option with prices starting from $1 only. 

The process is quite simple, you just upload the 3D files and their expectations will start the prototype designing and will deliver you the end product. 

The 3D technologies used by them are: stereolithography, multi jet fusion, selective laser melting, fused deposition modeling and selective laser sintering. 

Testing:

To ensure best quality management, various post manufacturing testing is done.

1. AOI (Automated Optical Inspection).
2. Flying Probe Testing
3. Visual inspection piece by piece. 

How to Place an Order?

To place an order the customer needs to register and login first. Once you login, one can directly quote and check the price for their order by providing basic details like number of PCB, thickness and layers. 

Gerber file is not needed till this stage, after price calculations you will have to add Gerber file to proceed with the order. 

After which you will be directed to the payment and shipment details page. 

Once the order is placed and payment is done, you can check the order status via your account to know the stage of progress. 

Order tracking and also filing for quality complaints in case of any defects in the delivered product is also provided. 

Lead Time and Value for Money: 

You can check the price calculator without registering to their platform. 

Based on technical capabilities offered by JLCPCB, the various cost and lead time informations are as follows for the given dimensions, quantities and layers:

For standard PCB

Standard PCB along with stencil:

Advanced PCB:

Advanced PCB along with stencil:

For SMT-Stencil:

Note, the lead time for stencil is not mentioned. 

Sponsorship Programs:

1. $54 New Customer Coupons- These coupons include shipping coupon, product coupon and SMT coupon that make $54. However, there are some conditions applied that need to be studied by the customer first before availing this coupon. 
2. PCB Sponsorship Educational Program- It is a technological incentive program that invests in free PCB development by teachers and students at academic level. Students and teachers in research laboratories and competition    groups are eligible for this sponsorship program. 
3. Electronic Influencer Program- Electronic influencers over 2k+ followers can apply for this sponsorship and they will get upto $100 coupons for 1-2 months. 
4. JLCPCB’s first raw materials testing video- JLCPCB takes the quality of raw material very seriously and through testing videos they sort between A grade and non-A grade raw materials. Following their video creation specification methods one can make the video for raw material testing. 

Other Important Details:

Payment and Refund: 

The modes of payments available currently are PayPal, Credit and Debit cards: Visa, MasterCard, American Express and UnionPay. They also accept payment via wire transfer from your bank to their bank directly. 

For refund, their policy is not well defined on their platform. However, the fundamentals remain almost the same as that of other manufacturers. 

Cancellation and refund can be initiated as long as the placed order hasn’t entered the production stage. Once the production stage is started, order charges will not be refunded but shipment charges will be reverted to the customer.

Delivery Services:

A detailed sketch of all the related information concerning shipping and delivery are provided on their platform. They ship to most of the countries globally and offer many shipment partners like: 

Further, just like instant quote and price check for PCB orders, JLCPCB also provides such quote and price check options for delivery prices for various countries and the range of prices that different shipping partners offer.

Apart from this the customs, duties and taxation policies are also discussed in detail. One can check for their country what criteria they need to follow and the additional charges incurred in the process. 

Shipment tracking is also provided. 

Authenticity and Quality Assurance:

One of the reasons for successful journey of JLCPCB is their quality assurance and authenticity of product due to adherence to multiple international standards and certifications:

For PCB Manufacturing: 

The manufacturers adhere to: 

JLCPCB UL Certification, ISO 9001:2015 Certificate, ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Management Systems Certificate, IATF 16949:2016 Certificate, REACH SVHC 224 substances compliance and RoHS Certificate of Compliance. 

For PCB Assembly:

The manufacturer adhere to: ISO 9001:2015 Certificate

Further, the various base materials and solder masks used by them are also quality assured and certified about which the customer can study on their platform.

Conclusion: 

From the detailed analysis and unwrapping of every essential information about the platform as a user, you can make informed choices about the manufacturer. 

Why you should choose JLCPCB:

1. Instant quote option available along with ordering of single units. 
2. Years of experience and skilled manpower behind PCB manufacturing.
3. Price calculator can be accessed without registering. 
4. The cost and lead time is very optimum and individual friendly.
5. Quality assurance and various certifications are adhered to by them.
6. Their customer service is very prompt and ready to resolve your query.

Why you shouldn’t choose JLCPCB:

1. Various customs and taxation policies to be followed that make the ordering process tedious and increases overall cost of delivering the product. 
2. Refund policy is not well defined. 
3. Sometimes there were delayed customer service.

Note : This article is not sponsored by JLCPCB, the article is written based on personal experience and information that’s given by few reviewer and JLCPCB.

The images courtesy is JLCPCB platform.