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Rapid Prototyping emerged in 1987 with stereolithography. After a medium growth rate of 22%, it began to decrease in the final years of the 20 th century, in parallel with a growing interest in Rapid Tooling (RT) systems. In fact, the idea behind RT responds better to the growing interest of the industry in reducing the time to market of new products and respective cost. The rapid production of a tool prototype allows the manufacturer to have a better overall control of the new product development process, not only of the product itself -visual aids for engineering, ergonomics, and fit -but also of the processing technology by having a prototype tool at an early stage of the process.The RT concept is not clearly defined yet, since there are two investigation and development perspectives. One of them is centralized in completely original technologies of directly manufacturing of prototype tools. The other one deals with indirect technologies based on a model manufactured by a RP (Rapid Prototyping) technology. This communication intends to better clarify the classification of the different RT systems and their respective stage of development at the moment.