It is safe to say that the printing press, embodied by the use of Gutenberg's inventional genius in the 16th century, was the primary reason that the Protestant Reformation was able to come to life and spread as rapidly as it did. While the ideas of reformation leaders such as Martin Luther, John Calvin, etc. were, in themselves radical enough to acquire popularity on their own, the printing press provided a more reasonable method for these ideas to be passed on to other people - particularly in the common language of the day. This is what led to the transmission of Luther's ideas at such a rapid pace. Because of this, before the Catholic Church could quell the heresies (according to Rome) that Luther was teaching, hundreds of copies of his beliefs had been printed.
For example, Bibles at the time of the Reformation were usually copied by the hands of monks and were not available in German (the common language of Luther's region). Because Bibles were in Latin and were incredibly time-consuming and expensive to produce, the prospect of a Bible in German was vehemently opposed by the Catholic Church yet because of the printing press, German translations of the Bible were able to be produced at an alarming rate to the Catholic Church. This led many in Germany to read, or at least hear the direct words of the Bible themselves, rather than hearing it interpreted from Latin by their priest.
Thus, without the printing press, the Protestant Reformation may never have occurred.
I'll start by providing a bit of context about the printing press to better answer your question. The printing press was a groundbreaking invention created by Johann Gutenberg in 1488. Before this invention, it was extremely difficult to produce books and other publications in mass quantities and at an affordable price, therefore most people did not have easy access to printed material.
With this new technology, books and other printed materials were able to be mass produced for the first time and at an affordable cost, resulting in the spread of ideas throughout much of Europe. The Bible, for example, was able to be disseminated throughout society, and even translated into different languages. The printing press acted as a catalyst for access to printed materials, educating people, and intellectual conversations about religion and other happenings.
During this time, people looked to the Catholic Church for most of their information and the Church often used censorship to maintain their power. With the invention of the printing press, however, people of the Protestant faith, most notably Martin Luther, were able to dissent from the Catholic Church by producing large quantities of informational pamphlets to spread throughout Europe.
The growth of the printing press was an absolutely crucial factor in the rise, and subsequent development, of the Protestant Reformation. For one thing, Protestantism is a denomination of a book—the book in question being, of course, the Bible. The printing press allowed new Bibles to be published more rapidly, leading to their wider dissemination in society.
Bibles could also be printed in native languages, or the vernacular, which made the Christian message more easily understood. Previously, Bibles were only available in Greek or Latin, and as such unavailable to the vast majority of Europe's literate population. Even then, their use was restricted by the Catholic Church, which didn't want its position as an intermediary between God and man to be undermined by individual believers' own interpretations of Scripture.
The printing press also allowed the extensive spread of pamphlets, books, and religious treatises written from the Protestant point of view. Many of these publications were highly polemical, as they conveyed their message in an often crude, unsophisticated style that was nonetheless easily comprehended by large swathes of the population. Luther was particularly adept at writing in such a style, combining the Protestant message with scathing criticism and abuse of his opponents.
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