A copper powder containing copper particles, wherein the copper powder has a packed bulk density of 1.30 g/cm.sup.3 to 2.96 g/cm.sup.3, and wherein a 50% particle diameter D50 when a cumulative frequency is 50% in a volume-based particle diameter histogram of the copper particles, and a crystallite diameter D determined from a diffraction peak of a Cu (111) plane in an X-ray diffraction profile obtained by powder X-ray diffractometry of the copper powder using Scherrer's formula satisfies D/D50?0.060.

Additive manufacturing apparatus and method for producing an object layer by layer. The apparatus has a slurry applicator (5) for providing a layer of slurry (3) with a predetermined thickness (d1). The slurry (3) is a suspension containing a liquid and particles eventually forming the object, and has between 10 and 70 volume % of particle content. A particle connection unit (7) is operative on the layer of slurry (3) to execute a single step particle connection process before applying a new layer of the slurry (3).