Gunpla

What is Gunpla?

Gunpla is short for Gundam plastic model: Bandai's snap-together kits of the robots, the mobile suits, from the Gundam anime series. They need no glue, come moulded in colour, and are built from runners with nippers, so a finished kit looks right without a drop of paint.

Painting is where many builders take them next. Panel lining, a matt topcoat and a little weathering change a kit more than any other step, and the paints and tools for that are on this site too.

The grades, and which to buy

Bandai sell every kit in a grade, and the grade tells you its size, detail and difficulty. Entry Grade is the simplest, built by hand without tools. High Grade, at 1/144, is the biggest range and the usual first kit. Real Grade packs Master Grade detail into a 1/144 kit. Master Grade, at 1/100, usually builds an inner frame under the armour. Perfect Grade, at 1/60, is the largest and most involved.

The SD kits are super-deformed, short and stylised; MGSD puts a Master Grade frame inside one. The same mobile suit often comes in several grades, and the same grade often has several versions of one suit, so a kit page names its version in full.

What we list, and from where

Every kit here is one a shop we compare sells, at the price that shop was charging when we last checked it. Where more than one shop sells a kit, their prices sit side by side, cheapest first.

A kit only gets a page once we have matched it to the shops that sell it, so the list grows as that matching is done. Premium Bandai web exclusives are not listed.

Where next

Match a colour to a real paint · Every paint we compare · Tools and hobby accessories · Every kit we price · BattleTech, giant robots on the tabletop