Yahoo Finance 11 best home printers 2022: Laser and inkjet for your wireless office setup
While wireless home printers might be a normal concept now, it was only a few years ago that technology caused a huge shift in printer design.
We’re sure that everyone reading this has, at some point, frantically tried to connect one to the back of the computer. All the while being worried that the ink cartridges have leaked or the paper you short-sightedly already put in the tray is about to spill out.
No more. The wireless printer is now, understandably, wildly popular, almost consigning its poor wired relative to the dustbin.
It’s easier to use and much more versatile, usually with the option to print directly from tablets or smartphones alongside your desktop. Printer apps have improved dramatically too, now linking up seamlessly with Google Cloud printing and Apple AirPrint.
Buying the printer is one thing, but be aware of ink costs. Most brands insist on using their own cartridges, and prices for these can vary substantially, so be sure to factor this into any purchase.
How we tested
We tested a range of wireless printers from some of the biggest household names. We were looking for printers that were easy to set up, printed fast and were cost-effective too. Here’s what we found...
The best home printers in 2022 are:
Best overall – Epson ecotank ET 2710: £165.90, Cartridgepeople.com
Best for a black-and-white home printer – Brother HL-L2350DW mono laser printer: £144.99, Argos.co.uk
Best for smartphones – Canon selphy square QX10: £149.99, Canon.co.uk
Best for a professional home printer – HP officejet pro 7720 A3: £195.90, Amazon.co.uk
Best for small spaces – Epson expression premium XP-6100: £89.99, Amazon.co.uk
Best for WFH – HP officejet pro 9020: £382.48, Amazon.co.uk
Best for the environment – Canon maxify GX7050: £648.88, Amazon.co.uk
Best for a mid-range eco-friendly home printer – Epson ecotank ET-3850: £379.99, Currys.co.uk
Best for value – Epson ecotank ET-1810: £169.99, Epson.co.uk
Best for an ink subscription system – HP envy inspire 7220e: £139.99, Hp.com
Best for an automatic document feeder – HP envy inspire 7920e: £169.99, Johnlewis.com
Epson ecotank et 2710 home printer
For a more eco-friendly approach to printing, Epson has a great range of ecotank products that use cartridge-free ink tanks, leading to a more efficient printing process that’s not only better for the planet, but also your wallet.
Like the other Epson printers on this list, the et 2710 is easy to set up, with the clean “Epson Connect” app doing most of the work for you. The print quality and speed is at least on par with any other printer on the list, and colour prints are especially vibrant. With no quality sacrificed for a more efficient and eco-friendly ink usage, more printers should be moving in this direction.
This home printer is out of stock at the moment, but you can sign up to be notified if it returns.
Read the full Epson ecotank et 2710 review
Buy now £165.90, Cartridgepeople.com
Brother HL-L2350DW mono laser home printer
The mono in the printer’s name refers to the fact that it’s a one-stop monochrome shop. If you need a printer that can rapidly whack out page after page of important black and white documents or your latest coming-of-age novel without breaking a sweat, this effort from Brother is one of the best out there.
Despite the large 250-sheet paper input, it’s a handy size for most tables, or to put under your desk. It’s also surprisingly quiet: Brother says that all the models within the HL range print at less than 50dB. We tested it late at night and felt more than comfortable doing so.
Read the full Brother HL-L2350DW mono laser printer review
Buy now £144.99, Argos.co.uk
Canon selphy square QX10 home printer
This is a very fun bit of kit. Almost a modern polaroid camera, simply pick a photo from your phone via the Canon app, frame how you like, and watch your square photo print in seconds. While it looks quite pricey on the surface, it’s a sophisticated machine: Canon claims that the high-quality prints will stay that way for 100 years (tested using an accelerated ageing method), so choose your photos wisely.
The portable mini-printer has a decent battery life, and feels sturdy enough to take with you on holiday. There are also options for filters and photo editing on the app for any last-minute airbrushing you need to do (don’t bother, you look great).
Read the full Canon selphy square QX10 review
Buy now £149.99, Canon.co.uk
HP officejet pro 7720 A3 home printer
Don’t let the “office” in its name fool you – the 7720 is a strong choice for a home wireless printer. It looks good, the HP Smart app is straightforward – the best app on the list – and print quality is high. Thanks to its wide format, the 7720 can print up to A3, with scan and copy up to legal size (slightly larger than A4).
The cartridges are quite expensive, but you do get great quality from them, and the optional high-yield cartridges let you print up to three times as many black-text and two times as many colour pages. The 7720 is also the perfect choice for professional-quality brochures and flyers at a decent price and in the comfort of your own home, producing water, smear and fade-resistant prints.
Read the full HP officejet pro 7720 A3 review
Buy now £195.90, Amazon.co.uk
Epson expression premium XP-6100 home printer
Epson’s XP-6100 proves that a good printer doesn’t need to cost the earth. Another all-in-one unit, it’s compact and stylish enough to fit in most settings, as a professional printer or something for the family. Once again, the app is easy to navigate, and printing, scanning and copying are straightforward.
The dual front-loading paper trays hold A4 and photo paper respectively, and there’s an option for double-sided printing. There’s no touchscreen, but that’s no issue when you have your phone or the computer, and the buttons work well enough. It also serves to keep the cost down. All in all, a well-performing printer at a good price.
Read the full Epson expression premium XP-6100 review
Buy now £89.99, Amazon.co.uk
HP officejet pro 9020 home printer
The 9020 is a bit of a beast and is much bigger than the other printers on this list. The printer comes with is a 35-page automatic page loader for hands-free copying, two 250-sheet paper trays that fit a full ream of paper, and the ability to scan both sides of a page at once.
The HP Smart app is a winner again here, helping you quickly access the files you want from Google Drive, Dropbox, the cloud or email – scanned pages can go the other way. It’s a big printer for big tasks, and the closest on this list to a proper office printer.
Although it’s currently unavailable, you can sign up to be notified once this model is back in stock.
Read the full HP officeJet pro 9020 review
Buy now £382.48, Amazon.co.uk
Canon maxify GX7050 home printer
This pricy maxify printer from Canon might demand a second look at the bank balance, but the maxify line offers a higher yield of colour pages, prints faster, and produces an impressively accurate range of colours, when up against Canon’s Pixma products (which are in themselves not something to be sniffed at).
The GX7050 is a refillable ink tank printer marketed to the business user, but would certainly be a useful bit of kit at home, especially for those who need professional-quality prints for their home office/kitchen table. There’s a stonking 600-sheet capacity, and the refillable element adds bonus green points. It’s more expensive, but in this instance, you get what you pay for.
Buy now £648.88, Amazon.co.uk
Epson ecotank ET-3850 home printer
For high-speed, business quality printing at an ultra-low cost, Epson has the goods. While the ET-3850 doesn’t have a touchscreen (something you might expect at this price) and is a pretty standard mid-range printer, the real advantage is the fantastic value ink. The ink that comes with the printer already has capacity to print 14,000 black and white pages (or over 5,000 colour), and any refill bottles cost – according to Epson – about 90 per cent less than traditional cartridges.
Besides the great value, this 3-in-1 does its job with minimal fuss, producing quality prints with impressive consistency. If you’re looking for a new printer for a small office or busy home (coursework won’t print itself), you won’t go far wrong with the ET-3850. Your bank balance will thank you.
Buy now £379.99, Currys.co.uk
Epson ecotank ET-1810 home printer
This is a printer that offers Epson’s top-class eco credentials with an even lower initial price. Prints from the more budget of the Ecotanks still offer good quality, an easy set-up and consistent wireless connection.
The price drop comes from the ET-1810 being a pure printing machine – no scan or copy capabilities here. However, for most users, this won’t be a huge problem. It’s a sound choice for a small household that needs a solid printer for the odd task without breaking the bank.
Buy now £169.99, Epson.co.uk
HP envy inspire 7220e home printer
The envy inspire 7220e is a great value 3-in-1 machine that offers pretty much everything you need from a home printer for a lower price than many rivals. It performs admirably, with solid printing speeds and impressive quality prints. However, HP’s secret weapon takes its inspiration from the era of Netflix.
HP’s relatively new HP+ system makes it easy to see how much ink you have left, and Instant Ink, HP’s subscription model, can work out as a long-term boon to your finances (with an up to 70 per cent saving). It also means that you don’t need to worry about traipsing out to a shop to find the right cartridges or refill bottles, as HP will send replacement ink directly to your door.
Buy now £139.99, Hp.com
HP envy inspire 7920e home printer
The HP envy inspire 7920e offers all the benefits of the 7220e (£109.99 Hp.com), but with the added bonus of an automatic document feeder. This might not seem important to most users, but for those who regularly scan or print multiple-page documents, ADF can save years of your life. Again, with the right HP Instant Ink subscription, ink refills are good value and hassle-free. If you prefer the hands-off approach to printing, this is the machine for you.
Buy now £169.99, Johnlewis.com
Home printer FAQs
Do you need a single-function printer or an all-in-one?
If you’re working from home, an all-in-one (or multifunction) printer can save on precious desk space, but there are reasons why you might prefer a single-function printer.
If you’re planning on printing a large number of documents at once or printing very regularly, it could be quicker and more cost-effective to invest in a dedicated laser printer with no scanning or faxing capability. Also bear in mind that your smartphone can scan to PDF, and that you probably can’t remember the last time you needed to send a fax.
That said, most of the best consumer-level inkjet printers are now multifunction by default. Even if you never plan on scanning, it’s more useful to choose a printer based on its other features: its size, capacity, whether it’s front-loading (and so requires less room), and whether it can print on both sides of the page.
Should you buy third-party ink or refill kits?
Printer ink is infamously more expensive than gold, caviar and vintage champagne, so it’s no surprise that many consumers turn to cheaper third-party ink and compatible cartridges to keep their printer running. These are usually the very same branded cartridges, simply refilled with fresh ink and sold under a different name.
Just because they’re cheaper doesn’t mean they’re of inferior quality. Printer manufacturers might clutch their pearls and insist otherwise, but third-party ink from a reputable brand won’t damage your printer, void your warranty or impact the quality of your prints. In most cases, a third-party cartridge will perform just as well as a more expensive one bought from the printer’s manufacturer.
Amazon is a major retailer that sells refill ink, offering a multitude of options for Canon, HP, Lexmark, and other leading brands. If you’re signed up to a Prime membership, which costs £8.99 a month or £95 annually, you’ll have access to unlimited next-day delivery, which will come in handy if you run out of ink unexpectedly and need to print important paperwork.
There’s also printer-specific retailers such as Cartridgepeople.com that are a one-stop shop for all your printer needs, so you can pick up new ink refills, paper and stationery in one shop. It also offers free delivery on everything.
Should you buy a refurbished printer?
You should avoid buying a refurbished printer if you can. Printers are complex machines with many moving parts, and every last one of them is looking for an excuse to jam. The insides become worn down or gummed up with toner or ink over time, even – or sometimes especially – if the printer isn’t being used.
Generally speaking, new printers are sold at a low price to lock customers into a brand of ink, so the cost savings of buying a refurbished, consumer-level printer aren’t worth the potential problems further down the line. If you do decide to buy a refurbished printer, check for a guarantee, recertification or fresh warranty from the manufacturer.
Wireless printers at a glance
Print / scan / copy | Size | Print speed | Paper capacity | Paper size | Connectivity | |
Epson ecotank ET-2710 | All | 375mm x 347mm x 179mm | 14 to 35ppm | 100 sheets | Up to A4 | USB, Ethernet, Wi-Fi |
Brother HL-L2350DW mono laser printer | 438mm x 283mm x 519mm | Up to 30ppm | 250 sheets | Up to A4 | USB, Ethernet, Wi-Fi | |
Epson expression premium XP-7100 | All | 390mm x 339mm x 183mm | 11-16ppm | 100 sheets | Up to A4 | USB, Ethernet, Wi-Fi, SD card |
Canon selphy square QX10 | 102mm x 143mm x 31mm | 43 seconds per photo | 20 sheets | Polaroid size | Wi-Fi | |
HP officejet pro 7720 A3 | All | 584mm x 444mm x 306mm | 18-34ppm | 250 sheets | Up to A3 | USB, Ethernet, Wi-Fi |
Epson expression premium XP-6100 | All | 349mm x 340mm x 142mm | 11-15ppm | 100 sheets | Up to A4 | USB, Wi-Fi |
HP officeJet pro 9020 | All | 437mm x 396mm x 318mm | 20-39ppm | 250 sheets | Up to A4 | USB, Ethernet, Wi-Fi |
Canon maxify GX7050 | All | 399mm x 410mm x 314mm trays retracted, 399mm x 645mm x 387mm trays extended | 24 ipm mono, 15.5 ipm colour | 100 sheets rear tray, 250 sheets cassette 1, 250 sheets cassette 2 | Up to A4 | USB, Ethernet, Wi-Fi |
Epson EcoTank ET-3850 | All | 375mm x 347mm x 231mm | 33 pages/min mono, 20 pages/min colour | 250 sheets | Up to A4 | USB, Ethernet, Wi-Fi |
Epson EcoTank ET-1810 | 375mm x 347mm x 169mm | 33 pages/min mono, 15 pages/min colour, 27 Seconds per 10 x 15 cm photo | 100 sheets | Up to A4 | USB, Wi-Fi | |
HP envy inspire 7220e | All | 460mm x 383mm x 191mm | 15 pages/min mono, 10 ppm colour | 125 sheets | Up to A4 | USB, Wi-Fi |
HP envy inspire 7920e | All | 460mm x 511.25mm x 233 mm | 15 pages/min mono, 10 pages/min colour | 125 sheets | Up to A4 | USB, Wi-Fi |
The verdict: Wireless printers
Your decision really depends on what you want from a printer. For a wireless printer that does everything you ask of it, produces high-quality mono and colour prints, saves on ink price and is better for the planet, the Epson ecotank ET-2710 is the best option. However, for a home office printer that prints black and white at an astounding pace, the Brother HL-L2350DW mono laser printer is perfect.
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