The unprecedented increase in component design space has led to significant focus on fusion-based additive manufacturing (AM) technologies. The new design possibilities integrate features and functionalities that are not supported by conventional manufacturing, and simultaneously achieve unitization of components. However, fusion-based AM suffers from a lack of diverse alloys, as conventional high-strength Al alloys are prone to hot cracking and other defect formation during printing. New alloy design approaches are being pursued to overcome these limitations. Current strategies for design of printable Al alloys for laser-powder bed fusion (L-PBF) are primarily experimental and revolve around grain refinement and eutectic solidification (ES). Each of these strategies targets hot cracking at only a specific stage of solidification. Consequently, the processing window of the alloy shrinks and fine-tuning of the alloy microstructure becomes difficult, thus prohibiting the activation of multiple deformation mechanisms. On the other hand, strategies that integrate microstructural refinement (MR) and ES attack the problem during multiple stages of solidification. Such MR+ES integrated alloy design strategies allow widening of alloy-processing-window (printability) and activation of multiple deformation mechanisms such as back-stress strengthening and work-hardening, thus producing alloys with excellent synergy of printability and performance. Display omitted •Design of Al alloys for laser-powder bed fusion (L-PBF) can lead to fundamental change in the microstructure evolution.•Proposed alloy design strategies lead to synergy between and printability and performance.•Hierarchical and heterogeneous microstructures have potential to overcome the strength-ductility tradeoff.•Alloy design incorporating the specific attributes of an AM technology is crucial to maximizing its potential.