Search “soft enamel vs hard enamel” and you will find a dozen confident comparisons, and most of them are about lapel pins. That matters, because a medal is not a pin. It is larger, it is often two-sided, it carries a ribbon, and it is produced in volumes where a tenth of a millimeter in a color channel turns into a reject rate.
We fill enamel in our Huizhou factory every day, on medals and on pins, and the difference between the two processes is not a matter of taste. It is a matter of process order, and almost every article online gets that order wrong or skips it. Once you know which operation comes first — plating or color — the rest follows: cost, durability, and what your design can physically hold. For the wider product context, start with our custom medals overview.
Why Most Enamel Comparisons Mislead Medal Buyers
Three errors show up again and again.
They describe pins, not medals. Pin comparisons obsess over the back — butterfly clutch versus rubber clutch, single post versus double post. None of that exists on a medal, which is why our custom pins work and our medal work are quoted on different logic. What matters on a medal is the face diameter, the ribbon attachment, whether the back is also decorated, and whether thousands of people will handle the piece at a finish line.
They describe the look, not the sequence. “Soft enamel is recessed, hard enamel is smooth” is true and useless on its own. Soft enamel is recessed because the color is applied after plating and shrinks as it cures inside a wall of metal. Hard enamel is smooth because the color is applied before plating and then ground flat. Those sentences describe two different factories doing two different things.
They quote a minimum color width without saying what it is for. The 0.3 mm and 0.5 mm figures are not marketing numbers. They are the narrowest channel each material can reliably enter and hold, and they decide whether your lettering survives.
Soft Enamel: Plate First, Then Fill
Soft enamel — what the trade also calls baked enamel or 烤漆 — is a thin, low-viscosity paint. That thinness is the whole point: it flows into narrow channels, levels itself, and does not need to be pushed. It is the workhorse of our enamel medals range.
The sequence is:
- Cast or strike the medal, leaving recessed channels where color will go.
- Polish the metal so the raised lines are clean.
- Electroplating — the full stack, described below.
- Fill the channels with enamel, one color at a time.
- Cure, then lacquer or assemble.
Because the color goes in after plating, it sits inside the metal walls and dries below the top of the line. Run a fingertip across a soft enamel medal and you feel ridges — the metal stands proud, the color sits in the valley. That is the signature of the process, and it is why soft enamel reads as “crafted” rather than “printed.” Thin paint also reaches further: it flows into a channel as narrow as 0.3 mm, which is why it can hold fine lettering, small numerals, and tight detail inside a crest. Nothing else in the enamel family gets that fine.
Imitation Hard Enamel: Fill First, Then Plate
This is the part the internet gets wrong. Imitation hard enamel — 假珐琅 — is not soft enamel with more coats, and it is not a different curing temperature. It is a reversed process, and that reversal is the entire product.
The sequence is:
- Cast or strike the medal, with channels.
- Fill the channels with a thick enamel paste, before any plating.
- Cure the paste.
- Grind and polish the whole face flat, so the color and the metal lines end up in one plane.
- Electroplate the finished face, then lacquer.
Read step 5 again: the plating happens after the color. That single fact explains everything buyers notice about hard enamel.
- It is flush. Polishing removes material from both the color and the metal, so the surface is one continuous plane. No ridges, no valleys.
- It feels like ceramic. Thick paste plus polishing plus the plated skin produces a dense, glassy, cool surface. That is where the “premium” impression comes from.
- The colors are limited. The enamel has to survive the plating bath, which restricts pigments and translucent effects. Bright fluorescent tones are much easier in soft enamel.
- It costs more. You pay for a second polishing operation, for paste instead of paint, and for the rejects created when polishing cuts too deep.
- It needs wider channels. Thick paste will not enter a hairline. The minimum fill width is 0.5 mm, about 60% wider than soft enamel.
That last point kills designs. A buyer sends a crest with 0.35 mm lettering and asks for hard enamel because it looks richer. It cannot be done — not because the factory is lazy, but because the paste physically will not enter a channel that narrow. The options are to thicken the lettering, drop the smallest text, or switch to soft enamel.
There is a hidden geometric cost too. Polishing removes metal, so raised lines end up thinner and shallower than drawn. A line that looks generous in the artwork can be fragile after grinding, which is why we ask for slightly heavier line weights on hard enamel.
The Two Processes Side by Side
| Soft enamel | Imitation hard enamel | |
|---|---|---|
| Order of operations | Plate → fill → cure | Fill → cure → polish → plate |
| Minimum fill width | 0.3 mm | 0.5 mm |
| Surface | Recessed color, raised metal lines | Flush, one continuous plane |
| Tactile feel | Ridged — you feel the design | Smooth, glassy, ceramic-like |
| Color range | Wide, including brights and translucency | Narrower; must survive the plating bath |
| Line weight after finishing | Unchanged from artwork | Thinner — polishing removes metal |
| Durability of color | Color sits in a protected valley | Color is sealed under plating |
| Cost drivers | Fill labor per color, plating | Fill labor, extra polish, plating rejects |
| Best for | Detailed artwork, tight budgets, big volumes | Premium commemoratives, tactile smoothness |
Curing: The Numbers Behind “Baked”
Both processes cure in an oven, and the schedule is not arbitrary. We run two stages:
| Stage | Temperature | Time | Purpose |
|---|---|---|---|
| Low (semi-cure) | 60–70°C | 60–90 min | Skins the enamel so metal lines can be wiped, or another color added |
| High (full cure) | 100°C | 60 min | Hardens the enamel and drives off solvent before assembly |
Most multi-color work passes through the low stage more than once. Get it wrong — too hot, too long — and the enamel skins before it levels, leaving a lumpy fill. Skip the high stage and the color stays soft under the lacquer, which shows up months later as a dull or scuffed face. This is unglamorous process control, and it is most of what separates a medal that looks right in year one from one that still looks right in year five.
The plating that precedes the fill runs on its own schedule: an alkaline copper base of about 500 seconds, acid copper for 20 to 60 minutes, then the color plate, then a tunnel-oven dry at 100°C for 40 minutes. Our manufacturing process page lists the full plating stack, and the plating finishes guide covers how each finish behaves under enamel.
The Other Fills Buyers Confuse With These Two
“Enamel” is a family, not a single material. Four other fills come up constantly in medal quotes, and each behaves differently.
| Fill | What it is | Minimum width | Process note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Soft enamel | Thin baked paint | 0.3 mm | Plate → fill → cure; recessed |
| Imitation hard enamel | Thick paste, polished flat | 0.5 mm | Fill → polish → plate; flush |
| Solid glass enamel | Dense, glassy, opaque | 0.5 mm | Plate → fill; smoother than soft, glossier |
| Translucent enamel | Semi-transparent, light passes | 0.5 mm | Needs high-temperature tape on the back during cure |
| Flat cure (soft enamel + epoxy) | Soft enamel capped with AP epoxy | Follows soft enamel | Same flow as hard enamel, different look — glossy dome over recessed color |
Two more treatments sit outside the table but get asked about constantly. Glitter is sprinkled onto soft enamel while it is semi-dry, then optionally sealed under AP epoxy; it is a decoration, not a fill, and it does not change the 0.3 mm limit. Glow in the dark is applied after the enamel is fully cured and reads as a pale green in daylight.
The flat cure deserves a warning, because it is the most commonly mis-sold option. It uses the soft enamel process — so it keeps the 0.3 mm minimum and the wide color range — but the face is then flooded with epoxy, which dries to a smooth, domed, glassy surface. Buyers who want “the smooth look of hard enamel with the colors of soft enamel” are usually asking for this. It is a legitimate answer; it is just not hard enamel, and it should not be priced or specified as such.
What Changes When the Object Is a Medal
Everything above is true of pins too. Three things change at medal scale.
Surface area works in your favor. A 60 mm medal has far more room than a 25 mm pin, so color fields are wide and the 0.5 mm limit rarely bites — unless the design contains small type. The failure mode is not the big shapes; it is the 6 pt text under the crest.
Two-sided medals double the work. If both faces carry color, both need filling and curing, and the piece passes through the oven twice. That is a real cost driver, and it is why single-sided color with a plain or engraved back is so common. On hard enamel the polishing happens before plating and assembly, so the ribbon area has to be planned into the artwork. Our medal ribbons page covers the attachment side, including the standard 860–900 × 20–30 mm ribbon.
Volume changes the economics of rejects. A 5,000-piece race order punishes any process with a high reject rate, and hard enamel’s polishing creates more chances to scrap a piece.
Which One to Specify
The decision is more mechanical than most buyers expect. Work through these in order.
Choose soft enamel when:
- The artwork has fine detail — small type, thin numerals, tight crest work. The 0.3 mm limit is the reason.
- The order is large and cost-sensitive — a race, a league, a school district, a giveaway at volume.
- You want bright or translucent color that hard enamel cannot hold through plating.
- You want the tactile ridge — many recipients read raised metal lines as a sign of substance.
Choose imitation hard enamel when:
- The medal is a premium commemorative — a milestone anniversary, a championship, a presentation piece.
- The design is bold and simple, with color fields at or above 0.5 mm and no hairline type.
- You want a flush, ceramic-like surface that photographs well and feels expensive in the hand.
- The palette is conservative — solid reds, blues, blacks, whites, metallics — and the quantity moderate enough for the extra polish to be absorbed.
Choose neither, and look at flat cure, when you want a glossy domed surface with soft enamel’s color range and detail. Choose solid glass enamel when you want a harder, glassier finish without the flush polish. Choose UV printing when the artwork is photographic or has gradients — it covers relief up to 7 mm and reproduces continuous tone that no enamel fill can.
If the design has both a large color field and small type, do not force one process across the whole medal. Fill the fields in hard enamel and handle the fine text another way, or simplify it. The worst outcome is approving a proof that looks right on screen and finding at sample stage that the smallest element cannot be filled.
On cost: fill is one line in a longer structure — mold, material, plating, fill, assembly, packaging — and each line scales differently with quantity, which is why we quote by tier rather than publish a per-piece figure. The pricing structure breakdown shows how those lines move together.
Defects, and What They Tell You
Enamel defects are diagnostic, and they tell you how to read a sample.
- Bubbles in the fill — air trapped in the paste, or a channel that was not clean. Common on hard enamel if the paste is over-agitated.
- Color bleeding over the metal line — fill too thin, or the wipe came too late in the semi-cure window.
- Lumpy surface — the low-temperature cure ran too hot or too long, so the enamel skinned before it leveled.
- Plating blister at the color edge — contamination before plating. On hard enamel this is the highest-risk defect, because plating happens after the color.
- Specks in the enamel — dust in the fill room. Cleanliness, not chemistry.
- Dull face after lacquer — under-cured enamel, or lacquer over a surface that was not fully dry.
We run three-stage QC across the enamel line for one reason: a color defect cannot be repaired without stripping the piece, so it is cheaper to catch at fill than to explain after delivery.
FAQ
Is hard enamel more durable than soft enamel? In one way, yes: the color is sealed under plating, so it cannot be chipped out of its channel. In another, no: that plating sits over a polished composite face and is sensitive to contamination during the bath. For a medal handled hard, soft enamel’s recessed color is often more forgiving.
Why is hard enamel more expensive? The paste costs more than paint, the process adds grinding and polishing, and polishing creates rejects when it cuts too deep. None of that scales down with quantity, so the gap does not close on small orders the way tooling does.
Can I get hard enamel with fine lettering? Generally no below 0.5 mm. The paste is thick and will not enter a hairline channel, and polishing thins whatever metal line remains. If the artwork depends on small type, soft enamel at 0.3 mm is the realistic route — or simplify the text.
What does “imitation” hard enamel mean? It means a synthetic enamel paste, not vitreous enamel fired at kiln temperatures. The look is close, the process order is the same, and the durability suits a medal. True vitreous enamel is a different, far more expensive process we do not run.
Can soft enamel and hard enamel be combined on one medal? Yes, and it is common — hard enamel for large fields, soft enamel or UV print for fine detail. The constraint is process order: a fill applied after plating cannot share a face with one plated after filling, so the combination has to be planned at artwork stage.
How long does an enamel medal take? Artwork proof in 24 hours, a sample in 7 to 10 days, bulk production in 7 to 15 days after approval. Multi-color pieces pass through the oven more than once, which is why color count is one of the first things we ask about.
Next Step
Send the artwork and tell us the quantity and the deadline. We will tell you which fill your design can actually hold — including when the smallest text has to grow before it can be produced — and quote soft enamel, hard enamel, and flat cure side by side where all three are viable.
Our factory has been filling enamel on medals since 2010, with capacity of 30,000+ pieces per day, an MOQ of 100 pieces per design, and export to 50+ countries. Proofs in 24 hours, samples in 7 to 10 days, bulk in 7 to 15 days, three-stage QC, and 100% conforming delivery.
Contact us with your design file, and we will come back with a fill recommendation and a quantity-tiered quote.
