We spent months with a bevy of inkjet, all-in-one printers from leading brands like Brother, Canon, Epson and HP. If you’re paying more than $100, your printer should be able to do a little more than just print out a single sheet, especially if you’ve been doing more work from home. A single-family printer will need to tackle essays and emails but also extend to visually heavy documents and photos of family memories.
For our latest update to this roundup, we focused exclusively on inkjet, all-in-one printers and did not include laser or photo printers (for our top picks in the latter category, see Best Photo Printers). Since inkjet printers tend to cost less upfront and are as good at printing text as they are at printing color graphics and photos, they have traditionally been appealing for families and general home use. Compared to laser printers, which use toner powder, inkjet printers use ink cartridges that don’t last as long and can get pricey over the long term. This has made them less appealing for high-volume printing, especially for people who work from home. However, in recent years, new ink tank technology has reduced the cost of ink replacement — and the cost per page to print — for inkjet printers, making them more competitive with laser printers while still offering better photo printing capabilities.
In the context of inkjet printers, “all-in-one” typically means a multifunction color printer that is capable of printing, copying and scanning on multiple paper sizes and stocks (including photo). Some of the printers we tested even have fax capability, for those who still need it.
Our testing pool of inkjet, all-in-one printers included several units at the top of the budget scale ($300 plus) and at the bottom (less than $100), but we found that units at either end failed to deliver an incredible experience across the board. Lower-cost units often had more clunky builds and didn’t deliver satisfactory performance with printing. Meanwhile, the higher-priced units offered more capacity and faster prints, but nothing that was extraordinary enough to justify their price for the average user.
After countless hours of print, scan and copy testing, we picked the top printers in a handful of categories but wound up with a modest-sized, sub-$200 printer that delivered a formidable experience as our best overall pick. Even after testing another 10 models in our most recent update to this roundup, it remains our top choice due to its mix of features, performance, design and price.
The best printer overall
HP Envy Pro 6455 Wireless Printer
AmazonThe HP Envy Pro 6455 is a feature-filled and reliable unit that proves you don’t need to spend a ton for great performance. As an all-in-one unit, it offers quality prints across text and visually heavy tasks alike while also being able to scan and copy with ease.
$150 at Amazon
$150 at HP
The best printer for home offices
Amazon
If you’re looking for an office-style inkjet, Brother’s massive MFC-J6555DW INKvestment Tank fits the bill. While its footprint is large, you won’t find many competitors that can match the INKvestment Tank’s speed, functionality and capacity at this price.
$330 at Best Buy
$430 at Amazon
Jake Krol/CNN Underscored
HP’s Envy Pro 6455 features a compact build that can fit into the smallest workspace, even though it is a multifunction device with the ability to print, copy and scan. It’s also an absolute champ at printing and was one of the easiest to set up of all we tested.
Most importantly, though, it succeeds with printing text-heavy documents, large keynotes and even the occasional one or two photo prints. On average, it takes about 15 seconds after you hit “Print” for the first page to shoot out, and we could easily crank through 20 pages double-sided in just under three minutes. That falls behind duplex units like the Brother and Canon all-in-one, which can start a job in less than 10 seconds, but it’s on par with other units at this price. The HP Envy Pro 6455 makes its presence known but not to the noisy degree of a laser printer or some of the massive units we tested. You’ll hear the two cartridges inside move back and forth, and while there is an option for a quiet mode, using it extends the printing time by five to 10 seconds with only a very slight reduction in noise as the payoff.
As for print quality, printed text arrived clear and crisp with deep blacks and no smudging around the letters. As we did with all printers, we gave each model some time to warm up and ran the alignment tests to ensure proper calibration and setup. With black-and-white prints, the HP Envy Pro 6455 could toss punches back and forth with much higher-priced units. There were no noticeable quality differences between this unit and ones from Brother, Canon or Epson. Heck, it was even on par with more expensive HP units. The ink was also dry, which is to be expected, once the print was complete.
When it comes to photo printing, HP wasn’t overly vibrant and delivered a more middle-of-the-road print. Its prints weren’t on the pro level that Canon and Epson printers can deliver, but they weren’t the worst prints we’ve seen either. For starters, HP didn’t cause huge issues in terms of the accuracy of the photo or by introducing artifacts (when the printer makes something appear that wasn’t intended) into the shot. The result with photo prints on the HP Envy Pro 6455 is an accurate depiction of a photo that doesn’t raise the brightness or vibrancy. It’ll look nice on your fridge or even in a frame but doesn’t get close to the quality of a pro job.
Suffice it to say, the Envy Pro 6455 is a well-versed printer that can handle an essay, planning doc or even a spreadsheet as well as a family memory. This printer utilizes one black cartridge and a tricolor cartridge, providing blue, red and yellow all in one. HP estimates that the black cartridge provides about 120 sheets and the tricolor can handle 100, which was in line with our experience during testing.
We’re also huge fans of the HP Instant Ink program, which is basically a subscription service for ink cartridges. It takes the hassle out of knowing when you’ll need ink, by monitoring levels and your printing usage to have new cartridges arrive before your current ones run dry. HP Instant Ink starts at $1 a month for 10 pages a month, but a more common plan is $6 a month for 100 pages. We’d also call out that the HP Instant Ink cartridges are physically larger and provide more ink than even a standard or XL. If you don’t want to use HP Instant Ink, you can purchase cartridges for the Envy Pro 6455 as well. A two-pack containing tricolor and black is $35, for comparison. You can sign up and give it a go directly from within the HP Smart app.
And the HP Smart app is the command central for the Envy Pro 6455. We mentioned that this printer also supports copying and scanning; that’s all controlled from the app, as there is no screen on the Envy Pro 6455. It’s a very modern approach with a focus on simplicity. There is a flatbed scanner and an auto document feeder for scans and copies, but you’ll control those from the HP Smart app on your Android, iOS, macOS or Windows device. There are also LED indicators and a button for power or canceling a job on the physical printer.
With scanning especially, we like how you can view the result in real time and make adjustments to the crop via the application. That HP Smart app is also how you handle the setup of the printer, and it’s the most intuitive of any model we tested. You open the app, it then finds the Envy Pro and you connect it to Wi-Fi. The app even walks you through how to insert ink and prints a few test pages.
The whole setup process took about eight minutes. With similarly priced printers, the setup process stretched closer to 25 minutes and some of the touch screen-centric setups resulted in connection problems. And the Envy Pro 6455 works with all the core printing standards, including Apple AirPrint. We tested with a range of devices, and many of the newer ones automatically detected the Envy Pro 6455 on the network.
As a whole, the HP Envy Pro 6455 delivers a great core feature set and dependable functionality for an affordable price tag. We tested cheaper options, but bulky builds and long setup times ultimately weighed them down — along with shaky prints. The Envy Pro 6455 starts with a strong modern build and pairs it with a super-simple setup process. It’s refreshing for a printer to be this easy to use, and the resulting prints were on par with units double the cost and our expectations.
Tom Samiljan/CNN Underscored
Fast, versatile and compact, the Canon Pixma TS7720 is a budget all-in-one printer that punches above its weight. Setup is super easy, with intuitive animations for inserting the two cartridges (one black, one tricolor) on the flip-up 2.7-inch LCD touch screen and a minimal-feedback-required print alignment processes. The smartphone app automatically finds your Wi-Fi, which makes connecting it to the printer as simple as entering your password.
While it doesn’t have a fax, the Pixma TS7720 can copy and scan. In addition to the built-in, 100-sheet-capacity paper tray, the printer has an automatic document feeder, making multiple-page copies a cinch, as well as auto-duplex (two-sided) printing. For text pages, the TS7720 was surprisingly fast, significantly beating some of the pricier and more full-featured printers we tested: 39 seconds from pressing “Print” on our iPhone to the completion of a three-page document. Text was clear, precise and smudge-free. Detailed color prints were much slower, however, with a map and photo PDF pamphlet taking about 48 seconds from pressing “Print” on our iPhones to finish single lines running through images, but the full-page borderless photo prints didn’t look noticeably grainer, darker or washed-out than those produced by pricier printers.
You’ll need to replace the cartridges every 180 pages each of color and black, so this model isn’t necessarily for heavy-duty business users. Even so, the PIXMA Print Plan, which automatically ships you more ink as soon as you start running low for $4 to $10 per month (or $0.20 pay as you go), can save you money, depending on your usage.
Lastly, its small, low footprint — 13.8 inches by 14.8 inches by 6.7 inches — and minimalist white design make it easy to fit almost anywhere, making it a good choice for dorm rooms or small apartments.
Tom Samiljan/CNN Underscored
Inkjet printers may be versatile, but the price of replacement cartridges can make them less practical than laser printers for people who print a lot and often. Tank printers, which use higher volumes of bottled ink instead of cartridges, have brought cost-per-page prices way down for inkjet printers, but they tend to be big and pricey. At $250, the HP Smart Tank 5101 can be considered a budget all-in-one tank printer, but the deal is even sweeter since it includes an estimated two years’ (or 6,000 pages) of black and color ink in the box. Even if you do run out of ink earlier, the cost of a bottle of black ink is $18 and the color bottles are $17 each, so if that’s all you’re spending every two years, it’s a significant savings.
With a low and wide profile that’s downright sleek and a minimalist 1.2-inch iCON LCD display, the 5101 doesn’t look like its big and bulky high-capacity brethren, but it still includes a copier and scanner. What it doesn’t have are duplex-printing capabilities (so it only prints single-sided pages), an automatic document feeder (so manual per-page scanning and copying), an enclosed paper cassette (the 100-page paper feeder is visible in the back) or a detailed color LCD screen (so you don’t have to depend on an app), but the trade-off in price and aesthetics are worth it.
Setup is easy, thanks to the HP Smart mobile app, with animated, self-swiping, step-by-step directions for filling each of the tanks with ink. The process is straightforward, and the bottles have special connectors on their mouths that are designed to minimize ink spilling on hands or anywhere else. Though, in a couple of instances, a half drop of ink seeped out, so it’s best to proceed carefully.
Print quality was excellent, with detailed, differentiated and color-accurate printouts of maps and rich tones on images, though it still took about 44 seconds from pressing “Print” on the iPhone to finish a PDF. A three-page, text-based Google Doc outline took about 26 seconds from pressing “Print” to completion. While it doesn’t have a fax, the Smart Tank 5100 can connect to your computer via USB in addition to Wi-Fi and is optimized for the full coterie of HP remote printing options, Apple AirPrint, Mopria Print Service and Wi-Fi Direct Printing.
If you plan to do high volumes and a wide variety of printing, the HP Smart Tank 5100 is a great way to do it affordably and stylishly.
Tom Samiljan/CNN Underscored
The MFC-J6555DW is a massive all-in-one printer, and you’ll really need to make space for it. It’s something that belongs in an office, and the basic light- and dark-gray color scheme fits in with this trope. Despite being a multifunctional powerhouse and a behemoth of a machine — it weighs 44.5 pounds and is about the size of an in-window AC unit — the MFC-J6555DW boasts one of the easiest setups of all the printers we tested. Though its high performance and speed are reminiscent of laser printers, this desktop or tabletop printer uses liquid ink. Rather than bottling the ink, Brother packages it in four large-capacity cartridges. This makes the process of transferring the ink into the printer’s internal tanks more akin to that of user-friendly, cartridge-based inkjet printers. Even by these standards, the process of loading the cartridges into their respective slots on this printer is seamless, with zero risk of ink spillage.
As befits an office-style printer, this unit is fast, capable of producing 30 pages, including legal-size pages, per minute from its 250-sheet paper tray. In our tests, it produced a full-color map with images in just under 30 seconds from pressing “Print” on an iPhone and a duplex three-page text document in just 18 seconds. Scanning is fast too; we manually scanned a couple of magazine pages and sent them to our phone in less than 15 seconds, but the automatic document feeder lets you set up a maximum of 50 pages to be copied, scanned or faxed (even legal-sized pages). Based on our unscientific impressions, it performed as quickly and efficiently as any office printer might, with the ability to automatically scan up to 25 pages per minute. Another bonus, the 100-sheet multipurpose rear tray can automatically feed envelopes, cardstock, photo and other types of non-letter paper to be printed, which comes in handy when doing mass mailings.
We’d make this our favorite printer of the whole lot but for its size and weight. If that’s not a deterrent, then it’s hard to argue with the bang for the buck here: $330 and it includes up to a year of ink in the box (about 6,000 black-and-white pages and 5,000 color pages). The total over-the-counter cost of ink replacement is about $255, but you’ll get four free months of Brother Refresh EZ Print Subscription service, which replaces your ink automatically for anywhere from $0.90 to $24.99 per month, depending on usage. If you want the powerful office-optimized features, versatility and speed, plus a fax machine, but don’t plan on large volumes of printing every month, then try the significantly less expensive MFC-6540DW ($250), which uses traditional cartridges that are estimated to last about six months ($109 to replace) — or 3,000 black-and-white pages — and are just as easy to install. It’s essentially the same printer but only prints 28 pages per minute and doesn’t have the automatic multipurpose rear tray. Not a big loss for a $100 price cut.
Tom Samiljan/CNN Underscored
Tank printers can go a long time without needing replenishment, but the all-in-one ET-3850 takes the cake, with approximately 7,500 black-and-white pages and 6,000 color pages before ink needs to be replaced. This can take up to two years for some people. That plus the fact that the suite of replacement ink bottles costs only $45, and you have a printer that delivers some of the lowest costs over the long term. And unlike some other tank printers, this doesn’t take up a lot of real estate on a table or desk, though it’s a bit taller than some other printers.
Setup is easy. We just scanned a QR code on the front of the printer, which prompted us to download the Epson Smart Panel app. The chatbot-like interface is useful because you can easily scroll up and down to refer to previous steps in case you get lost. The ink-dumping via bottles was easier and less prone to spillage than on the HP, thanks to a tighter connection between the bottle mouth and the tank opening, and the directions were much more reassuring, telling us exactly when it was okay to take the bottle off.
The printer is surprisingly fast on color maps on paper, which took about 29 seconds from pressing “Print” on our iPhone, and the colors were differentiated with no lines in any images, but the three-page outline took a surprisingly long 52 seconds to complete a duplex (two-sided) print. The printer is capable of generating 15 pages per minute on single pages, which is slower than some of the tank competition but acceptable. Thanks to its high-res flatbed scanner, scan and copy quality is balanced and realistic and can be done in bulk with the automatic document feeder, while the paper tray holds 250 pages.
If high printing volume at a reasonable replacement cost is important to you and you have limited space in which to put your printer, then take a serious look at the ET-3850, which delivers on both those fronts, and is a cinch to set up and maintain to boot.
After we decided on a pool of printers from a variety of manufacturers, ranging from the affordable to the luxurious, we got to testing. Just as we cast a wide net with models, we also did so when considering which features to test.
After we unboxed the printer, we paid close attention to what was needed for setup, any hiccups that occurred along the way and the total length of the process. Our top pick, the HP Envy Pro 6455, was the quickest of the bunch, at eight minutes for connectivity and ink installation. HP is integrating its Smart app in many of the printers we tested, and that acts as the main control panel. Other manufacturers, like Canon, also offer apps, so we factored those in here.
To test printing, we had an array of documents ranging from just a few lines scattered on a page to long 30-page documents with graphic elements and heavy text blocks. We printed each test set multiple times and compared prints across printers. We also attempted printing on different surfaces (e.g. a table that shakes more than most). For copying and scanning, we had several test pages which we ran through each printer multiple times. We looked at the quality of scans and copies to see if any artifacts were introduced.
During the setup process and throughout using the printers, we looked at forms of connectivity. We factored in which version of Wi-Fi was found inside, as well as whether or not a printer could be paired with Bluetooth, Apple AirPrint or Google CloudPrint.
We also paid close attention to the included warranties with each unit.
Compact but packed with features, the Brother MFC-J1800DW brings some unique offerings to the table, not least of which is a built-in capability to cut letter-size paper in half as you duplex print, so you can essentially print out four pages on just one 8.5-inch-by-11-inch sheet of paper. This is perfect for, say, invites and flyers, but it also saves paper. Setup is super easy, including the four ink cartridges, and the printer can be controlled via the Brother Mobile Connect app for remote printing or via the responsive 2.7-inch touch screen. Other productivity-friendly features include a 150-page paper tray, a 20-page automatic document feeder and a 17-page-per-minute printing capability. Print quality, including for photos, is excellent, with realistic coloring on images and precise text. The only downside is that ink runs out quickly — we already started to get warnings on replacing the black cartridge during our testing — but the Brother EZ Print Subscription Service can make replacement easy, seamless and discounted depending on your usage.
This INKvestment all-in-one printer from Brother was nearly our best overall pick, as it brings a new ink type into the industry. It also doesn’t carry a very heavy price tag for liquid ink. But the HP Envy Pro 6455 beat it out not only on price but for ease of use. Brother throws a lot at you directly on the front of the printer, as you get a screen and tons of buttons. It’s also a fax machine, so if you need that feature, it’s an excellent option.
But as far as a standard all-in-one, we still think traditional ink cartridges provide a strong amount of value, and coupled with HP’s simple Envy Pro, that makes it the best pick.
Not only does this all-in-one from Canon undercut larger printing powerhouses in price, but it matches many in terms of features. Compared with the Brother printer above, print and copy speeds were on par, meaning it has the ability to print a lot of pages in a little bit of time, including duplex jobs. It has two key differences, though.
Setup was a bit harder on this Maxify. It wasn’t so much that the screen was hard to use, but the Wi-Fi connection did take a few attempts. We eventually did get the Maxify MB5420 added, though, after the third try. The companion Print app (which is not required) wasn’t the most intuitive either. The Canon really did shine with photo prints, though, offering rich colors and a high level of accuracy. We didn’t encounter any artifact issues with this printer either. If you have a heavy workload that falls into the realm of creative tasks with heavy visuals, this MB5420 deserves a look. Just make sure you have the budget and space.
The Pixma G7020 is one of the newer “MegaTank” options from Canon. These printers trade classic ink cartridges for a liquid ink solution. Visible through the front of the G720, you’ll see a few clear vertical tubes that hold the various colors. And you’ll load the ink via a tube with a triangle top. Be warned, though: Don’t get the ink on clothing or skin, as it is hard to get out. The advantage here is a lower cost to print using this ink type.
In terms of quality of the print, the Pixma G7020 succeeded easily with text and traditional prints, while also scaling to create vibrant photo prints right from our home. It was a bit faster to get connected than the Maxify above, but we prefer the controls on that model. The Pixma G7020 has a basic series of buttons and a small non-backlit display. We think for the typical home office, you’ll be better served with the HP Envy Pro 6455.
The Epson XP-4200 was one of the cheaper printers that we tested and represents a budget option. It’s a fairly average printer that aims to make a splash with a sizable touch screen and a pretty easy setup. For the price, though, you do lose a bit in terms of quality for printing and scanning. We found that with black or color, there could be waves or uneven areas in terms of the print quality. The color quality was just not up to the standards that we were seeing across the board from our testing pool. And at around $50 more, the HP Envy Pro 6455 is a more well-rounded option.
The XP-7100 sits in the same realm as the HP Envy Pro 6455 as an all-in-one solution designed for homes that are also used for a little work — or rather, in our work-from-home world, a heavier print load that spans the gamut. It uses traditional ink cartridges, and you’ll need four of them, which ups the cost on replacements. It really shines with photography, delivering prints on par with the quality of the Canon printers, both of which surpass the photo quality of the HP Envy Pro 6455.
However, if you’re not looking for a printer that will primarily be used for photography purposes, we think you’ll be better served by the Envy Pro 6455.
The OfficeJet Pro 9015e is kind of like the Envy Pro 6455 on steroids. It has many of the same features but enriches them. It all starts with a larger build that adds in a sizable touch screen for easy use, but the HP Smart app is still in full force here. This printer holds more paper, which is helpful for larger jobs. It is also more business-oriented, with a faster duplex function.
Speed is a common theme with the OfficeJet Pro 9015e, both with prints and with data getting to the printer. The 9015e was always a second or two faster to start printing than the Envy Pro 6455. So if you value a zippy, fast experience above all else, the OfficeJet Pro 9015e is an excellent pick.
If Apple made a printer, it would probably be the Tango X. It’s billed as a smartphone-first printer, with no screen and one of the most unique compact designs of any printer we tested. The Tango X features a fabric cover that wraps around the printer to disguise it and give it a more homey feel. It can print pretty well, but it’s not the fastest.
In order to use the copy or scan function, you’ll need to pull out the smartphone app to crop the image and see if the quality makes it usable. Most of the time we had to retry to get a nice quality scan. The Tango X can fit almost anywhere, and it feels like this might be where printers are going next. We’d like to see some improvements in the all-in-one feature set and with the hardware inside that makes the prints happen, though.
The cost of the printer isn't the only thing you need to know about upfront. Make sure you see the cost of ink as well.
If you want a great printer to perform a specific task, make sure you're shopping for specifically that. Very few "all-in-one" printers are truly great at everything.
With a lot of people still opting to work from home, we've seen a renaissance for home printers and printers for small home offices. If you're one of the many people who need a printer for yourself, CNET is here to help you find the best one. I have been testing this latest crop of printers for over a year now, with dozens of printers running at the same time. It gets a little noisy, but each printer I test narrows down the best overall. Those are the ones we are listing here.
Every printer we've tested below can manage basic printing needs. For example, they can handle mobile printing and wireless printing from a phone or any PC, Mac or Chromebook, which is a must when it comes to office printers. They can also print over a cabled connection and via wireless printer connectivity. (Note that some, but not all, printers support Apple's AirPrint and Google's Cloud Print protocols, which are usually less onerous than the printer vendors' proprietary systems.)
For a home office that has just one or two people using it, the HP OfficeJet Pro 9015e is the best overall choice. The print speed is excellent and all the printed words were crisp and clear. This isn't a photo printer, and it shows, but it works well enough for daily imagery tasks. If you are using it to print brochures or Word documents, this is an almost perfect printer for you.
Pros
Cons
All-in-one
Yes
Laser or inkjet
Inkjet
Quoted pages per minute
30 (B/W)
Paper input capacity
225
Price
$$
$345 at WalmartIf you work from home but need all the advantages of an office printer, the OfficeJet Pro is an excellent choice. In terms of sheer printing speed, the HP is ahead of most others in its price range. It printed the 10 pages in just 32 seconds and scanned and printed them in 1 minute, 12 seconds. Very impressive.
While the images and graphics aren't the best, they were on par with the average quality of at-home printers. The text was excellent with clearly defined edges, even when printing in Comic Sans. Of the printers I've tested so far, the OfficeJet Pro is the most versatile. It also comes with six months of free ink, based on a standard usage if you sign up for HP Plus. While HP Plus does give you some extra helpful app choices for free and the ink, the downside is you can only use HP inks while subscribed to it.
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$150 at Best Buy $150 at B&H Photo-VideoAll-in-one
Yes
Laser or inkjet
Inkjet
Quoted pages per minute
25 (B/W)
Paper input capacity
500
Price
$$
$150 at Best Buy
First off, this is not a typical printer machine. The bulky square shape is not something you would want to see in a fashionable home office. Because of the extra paper tray, the Epson can hold a large amount of paper for use. This makes it perfect if you and another person use it daily. It prints fast too -- the fastest in our test, though the scanning is a little slow. The graphics, text and webpage text were all excellent, although the image quality on glossy paper was only good. This is a workhorse designed for high-volume text, not imagery.
My only real issue with the Workforce Pro was the size of the ink cartridges. It's great that you have two large paper trays to hold a lot of paper, but if the amount of ink you have doesn't match, then you are going to have a problem.
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$80 at Best BuyPros
Cons
All-in-one
Yes
Laser or inkjet
Inkjet
Quoted pages per minute
8.8 (B/W)
Paper input capacity
100
Price
$
$80 at Best Buy
The Canon Pixma TR4720 is not going to be winning any awards in any category. In all of my testing, it came out around the middle of the pack in just about every category. While that could be seen as a negative in a printer that costs several hundred dollars, for one that is as cheap as the Pixma, it's encouraging.
The Pixma scored better in color reproduction when placed against other, more expensive all-in-one printers when printing on glossy paper. Some printers suffer from dimpling when printing images but the Pixma didn't and the skin tones were far better on the Canon image than on other brands. My only real negative is the machine's volume. You can tell it was built on a budget, but as far as budget printers go, this one's pretty good.
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$170 at AmazonAll-in-one
Yes
Laser or inkjet
Inkjet
Quoted pages per minute
12 (B/W)
Paper input capacity
100
Price
$$
$170 at Amazon
HP's latest Smart Tank is a midlevel all-in-one with some nice features and a few that are missing. In all our tests, it did very well, especially the website printing test, where all the graphics were as crisp and clear as the text. The image test was good too, although not as good as that of the more expensive Smart Tank 7301. The colors were vivid, and there was no sign of chromatic abrasion. There was a little grain in the image, but nothing that better paper couldn't fix.
My big bugbear with the 5101 is the rear-loading paper tray. It makes the printer deeper than a standard shelf, limiting where you can put it. It also limits the amount of paper it can store to just a few sheets, making it less than ideal for a larger workload. The lack of a scanner feeder on the top also slows you down, forcing you to scan each document a single page at a time.
Overall the 5101 is a good choice if you want excellent color re-creation at a reasonable price. Because it's an ink tank system, the ink should last at least a year.
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$117 at AmazonPros
Cons
All-in-one
No
Laser or inkjet
Thermal
Quoted pages per minute
72 (B/W)
Paper input capacity
Takes rolls of labels
Price
$
$117 at Amazon
I love a tool that is for one purpose, and it does that purpose almost perfectly. The Nelko thermal printer is specifically designed to print labels for packages -- although it does print other labels, too -- and if you have an Etsy or Shopify store, it can be an invaluable tool.
Most of the tests I've designed for this article don't apply to the Nelko, although the print speed per page is shockingly fast, so it is not comparable to the other printers here. It's also at the top of the pack of the thermal printers I've tested. The app-controlled Bluetooth connection makes it even easier to print shipping labels. Simply purchase them through Etsy on your phone and print them using the app. You can even crop the image to remove the white space. It's so simple I should have bought one years ago.
My only gripe with the Nelko is the lack of roller hooks. I like that the printer is small, but there is no room for a roll of thermal stickers, limiting you to single sheets, or jury-rigging something to fit.
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$400 at Best Buy $400 at Amazon $400 at B&H Photo-VideoPros
Cons
All-in-one
No
Laser or inkjet
Sublimation Inkjet
Quoted pages per minute
Variable depending on image quality
Paper input capacity
330
Price
$$$
$400 at Best Buy
Sublimation is the process of transferring ink from paper to another material like t-shirts, mugs and canvases. There are plenty of options if you are looking to convert a standard printer to use sublimation ink, but if possible, you should buy a dedicated printer like the Brother SP1 for the job.
Brother has recently entered the sublimation market with the SP1, and it's a pretty impressive offering. Like all modern printers, it has Wi-Fi printing and, using the Artspira app on your phone or tablet, you can create great layouts for printing just about any design on anything you can heat press. I appreciate how easy it is to use, although I wish the inks were a little bigger. The price is excellent for a sublimation printer, too.
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$135 at Amazon $160 at WalmartPros
Cons
All-in-one
Yes
Laser or inkjet
Inkjet
Quoted pages per minute
10
Paper input capacity
100
Price
$
$135 at Amazon
After testing the Expression I was pleasantly surprised at how well this printer did. Being Epson's budget option it could have been poor, but instead performed excellently at text reproduction and about average on the image quality. The setup was quick and easy and the Wi-Fi connection seems to be solid wherever I put it in my house. Print time was average at 1 minute, 15 seconds, but the text quality more than made up for the speed. All of the text, even the photocopied text was legible and smooth.
The only downside is how small the ink cartridges are on this printer. I know ink is where companies make the most money, but replacing these tiny cartridges every few weeks or months will get old quickly.
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Not all the printers we test make it to the top table. Some of them are good but don't quite make the top of our list, some we replaced with a new version and some are so bad that we omitted them entirely. Here are some of the printers that nearly made it, or have been in the best list but replaced by different models.
Show more $649 at AmazonPros
Cons
The Sawgrass SG500 is purpose-built to print using sublimation ink and paper. It works great, too: You can print up a storm of artwork to put on T-shirts for the whole family. While this has a larger ink well than the Brother, the creaky feeling of the plastic and the extra hundreds of dollars it costs means it can't quite land this printer a top slot.
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$80 at AmazonPros
Cons
The Munbyn is good -- for a thermal printer. It printed quickly, and its labels were crisp and sharp with no issues reading barcodes. It fell when trying to connect to the app. I found the app needed a lot of work and it failed to connect more times than it connected. If it can solve that, it should be a good printer. I'm currently testing the new version, so I'll keep you updated on how that goes.
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What you intend to print will determine which is the best printer for you. If you're mostly working with shopping lists, concert tickets or travel itineraries, having excellent print quality is arguably less important than print speed and price. If you're using your printer for professional materials or photo printing, then color accuracy, printing quality and the inclusion of features like borderless printing will be primary considerations when you're looking for the right printer.
Another factor to consider is the cost of ink and ensuring you have enough ink to print everything you need. (There's nothing more frustrating than having a printer but no ink in the ink tank.) Inkjet printers use liquid ink to print, whereas laser printers use toner cartridges containing powder. Even if you're getting a great printer deal, just be sure to do some research into how you'll refill the ink, so you can choose the best printer for your overall budget. Some new printers include an ink subscription in their original price tag, so that may be something to consider as well.
Show moreFor a long time, CNET's methodology for testing printers didn't change. Our original testing was designed in the days when Wi-Fi printers were rare, and faxing was an important consideration when choosing a device. These days, Wi-Fi is standard, app-controlled printers are everywhere, and what and how we print has changed considerably. I designed a new set of printing parameters in 2022 that I hope will mesh with how we use printers nowadays.
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Ink subscriptions are becoming more common, with several of the printers on this list offering them as part of the original cost. Are they any good? It all depends on how much ink you use. If you're printing more than 100 pages a month, then yes, it likely is a good deal. Less than that and you may find you don't need it.
Most ink subscriptions offer you a certain number of months free, so it's worth trying it to see if it can fulfill your needs, but remember to cancel it before you're supposed to start paying if you don't want it.
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The most common printer types are:
Printer prices can vary from $100 for simple budget printers, to $700 or more for complex printers that can seem like magic. Our favorite printers, especially the all-in-one printers that scan and copy as well, tend to sit at the $200 to $300 mark. If you only need something for text, you can get a good one for $150.
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