Lasers have wide–ranging applications in the manufacturing field (e.g., cladding, welding, cutting, machining, drilling). Extensive work is being conducted to apply laser cladding as a Rapid Prototyping (RP) process. In this paper the authors illustrate various principles of laser cladding in rapid prototyping. Important process parameters for the control of the laser cladding process are discussed as well as the experimental methods adopted, and results obtained by, various authors.