Best Popular Choice Printers Online 2022

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The Best Printers You Can Buy Today

Canon Pixma TR150

Brother MFC J995DW

Brother MFC L2700DW

Epson Ecotank ET5850

HP Officejet 250

Canon Pixma TR8620

HP Envy 7855

Buyers Guide Questions

How to choose a printer for Home or office?

Whatever you need to print, there's a home printer that can do it. But knowing how to choose a printer isn't always easy, given the sheer number of options on the market. To help, we've put together a quick-and-dirty buying guide for selecting a home printer, with simple explanations of some of the most common terms, plus recommendations that will serve the majority of buyers.

The first question all printer buyers must tackle comes down to a simple matter of what and how much you plan on printing. Inkjet printers use cartridges of ink that are applied wet to paper and rapidly dry, while laser printers use toner, a type of ink dust that bonds to paper for fast results and efficient resource use.

Color inkjet printers comprise the bulk of the market simply because they can print just about anything: Essays, pie charts, glossy photos, you name it. And today's inkjet printers and all-in-ones are fast, often with print speeds that rival or surpass their laser counterparts.

Laser printers are still a good bet for office settings when most of the printing that you need to do is in monochrome. For the most part, monochrome laser printers can be purchased at affordable prices, offer good print speed, and provide prints at a lower cost per page than a color inkjet. But you have to decide whether to give up the flexibility that a color inkjet printer offers. Color laser printers are another option, but they generally have a higher cost per page printed than a color inkjet.

Laser printers tend to have excellent page yields; their long-lasting toner cartridges can last between 3,000 and 20,000 pages before they need to be replaced. Inkjet cartridges tend to last for up to 2,000 to 2,500 on average. That's less important if you don't print much or often, but for prolific printers or those buying for an office, it can make a real difference.

A multifunction printer is a printer that can also scan and fax as well as print. They come in both inkjet and laser varieties and are usually called ???all-in-ones??? or multifunction printers (MFPs).

For home use, a multifunction unit makes a lot of sense, not only because it's cheaper than buying a printer and a standalone scanner, but also for the sake of saving room. Since all-in-ones are extremely common and manufacturers rarely charge much of a premium for them (you can often find some for as little as $50 to $60), we highly recommend them for home users.

Speed, resolution, and color claims

PPM: This means "pages per minute" and is a guide to how fast a printer can print pages. That seems simple enough, but PPM can quickly grow complex. For example, printers have very different PPMs for black and white versus color, so it's common for many printers to provide two different PPMs if they are color-focused. PPM isn't especially important for home printers unless you find yourself under time pressure for a print job or need to print a lot at once. Average black-and-white PPM is around 15 to 20 pages. Color tends to be less, at around 10 to 15 pages per minute.

DPI: This refers to "dots per inch" or how many dots of ink the printer can apply to a square inch of paper. This spec is useful in studying just how good a printer is at creating high-resolution, high-detail images. It's also a little outdated, however: Newer printing methods and software can enhance the resolution of a printed image without changing the DPI, so don't let it be the ultimate deciding spec.

Duty cycle: This number is how many pages per month a printer can reasonably be expected to print. You want your expected number of pages per month to be well below this number so your printer doesn't experience as much wear and tear. It's an important number for a busy office with lots of printing needs, but it's less important for the typically less-intense home use.

Connectivity

USB: USB connections are common on printers, with the USB-A standard being especially common. This allows you to hook up external hard drives and a variety of other devices, then use the printer's menu screen to print files directly off of them. It's useful if you don't want to use your computer as a go-between. Cameras and other devices supporting the PictBridge standard can make this process even smoother, but it's not as necessary as it was when introduced in 2003. Keep in mind that most home printers don't support USB-C connections yet, although that's changing.

Ethernet: Printers may also be equipped with Ethernet ports for wired connections to the internet. Printer data needs are fairly basic, however, and a wired Ethernet connection is rarely necessary for a home printer (it can be more useful in some office printer setups).

Wi-Fi: The majority of home printers are designed to connect directly to your Wi-Fi network. You will typically provide them with your Wi-Fi information during setup. Then you can download software on your computer, phone, or another device to send printing jobs directly to the printer, no cable necessary. It's one of the most convenient options for home projects. Wi-Fi connections also allow for remote printing to an office, which can be very important in work-from-home situations.

Wi-Fi Direct: Wi-Fi Direct is a peer-to-peer connection not really related to your Wi-Fi network. Instead, it establishes a secure signal directly between a device and the printer. Apple's AirPrint, for example, is a type of Wi-Fi Direct connection, and other platforms support similar technologies. It's safe, quick, and great for on-the-spot printing needs.

NFC: NFC (Near-Field Communication) is also available on some models, letting you connect your printer to a smartphone or tablet by simply touching the device to a specified area on your printer.

Cloud printing: Many fully featured printers, particularly AIOs, now offer internet-based features that let you access photos stored on sites such as Facebook, Flickr, Dropbox, and Google Drive, as well as remote printing and access to arts and crafts you can print out. Keep in mind that if your printer isn't connected to the internet, you won't be able to access said services or print to it remotely from devices such as a smartphone or tablet.

SD cards: Some printers may also have slots for SD cards, which you can then navigate through using the printer's menu and choose select files to print. This may be especially useful for photographers who can transfer SD cards directly from cameras to printers.