Compare the Best Inkjet PrintersApril 2019

There are 2 main types of printers available on the consumer market - inkjet and laser printers. Both have strengths and weaknesses, and your choice will largely depend on what you plan on using your printer for. This guide will concentrate on information about inkjet printers - for a detailed rundown of laser printers, please see the guide under the Laser/LED printer category.

So, inkjet printers. As the name would suggest, these printers function by squirting a thin, focussed stream of black & coloured ink onto the page. This process makes inkjet significantly slower than laser printers, however there are capable of printing far more vivid colours, higher detail photos, and are generally far more preferable for colour-dependant printing.

Ink Cartridges

Inkjet printers are generally cheaper than laser printers, however they have significantly higher running costs. This is because the individual ink cartridges used for the printing (usually 4 - black, yellow, magenta & cyan) are expensive to purchase, and are used up far quickly than toner cartridges for laser printers. Therefore though inkjet printers may seem like a good bargain when you first buy them, they may be a false saving if you only print black and white documents - a laserjet will save more money in the long term.

On the subject of cartridges, there are two main types of ink cartridges used for these printers - dye and pigment inks. While there isn’t a massive difference between the two, dye inks give more vivid and brighter colours, whereas pigments inks are more resilient, and less prone to fading. However recent improvements to both types of ink have shortened the gap between them, meaning you won’t really go wrong with either choice of ink type.

Print Speed

Inkjet printers are significantly slower than their laser printing cousins. However even within inkjet printers, there is a significant variety in print speeds - some models of inkjet printer can take double the time to print a page when compared to newer and more efficient models. All of our printers have detailed stats on the number of pages they can print a minute, broken down into black and white, colour, photo, etc. This will allow you to make the best decision as to the printer that best suits your needs.

Print Quality

When choosing an inkjet printer, print quality is among the most important considerations. The output quality of the printers on our site are measured in dots per inch (dpi) - higher dpi printers use more ink in denser configurations. This allow for far more detail and colour depth to be packed into every inch of the printing, leading to far higher quality prints.

It is also important to consider the number of print nozzles when choosing an inkjet printer. The more nozzles a printer has, the higher the density of ink it can apply to the page. Printers with a very high number of nozzles will be more expensive than other models, but you will gain far higher-quality prints from it, so it may well be worth the expense.

Connectivity

Most models of inkjet printers have several different network connectivity options to make printing easier and more efficient. Ethernet connectivity is now a common feature in modern printers - so data can be transferred over a network without having to plug your computer into the printer directly. This makes it far easier to share printers with groups: the printer can be placed in a central area and used freely by everyone around.

Additionally, many models of inkjet printer also have wifi and/or bluetooth connectivity. These options mean that you do not even have to use a wire to use the printer - data can be transferred over wireless connection.

Finally, the newest models of printers have support for cloud or app printing. These options allow you to send a document to print from anywhere in the world - from a browser over the cloud, or from an app on your smartphone. While you will pay more money for these options, the convenience they provide may be worth the extra expenditure.

Inkjet Printer Prices

The price range of inkjets is from $29 to $5,399 and in total we found prices for 102 inkjets. The average price of a new inkjet is $405 and the 80% of inkjet printers are priced between $50 and $680. The HP DesignJet Z5200 is the most expensive inkjet printer that we found at $5,399, and the HP Deskjet 1112 is the cheapest at only $30.

Inkjet Printer Brands - Price Range

The average price of Xerox inkjets is $2,454 which is the highest average price of all inkjet brands. Xerox inkjets range in price from $254 to $4,655.

HP inkjets start at $30 and their most expensive inkjet costs $5,399. The second highest average inkjet price out of all brands is HP inkjets with an average price of $441.

Brother inkjet printers start at $163 and their most expensive inkjet printer costs $426. The average price of Brother inkjet printers is $307 which is the third highest average price of all inkjet printer brands.

Inkjet Printer Brands - Average Ratings

We have evaluated 388 expert reviews and 4,970 user reviews for inkjet printers and used this data to evaluate the average rating for each brand of inkjet printer. The top three inkjet brands are Epson, HP and Canon. Epson has an average rating of 86%, HP has an average rating of 86% and Canon has an average rating of 81%.

Biggest Inkjet Printer Retailers

We found 87 current offers for inkjet printers from eBay making it the biggest inkjet printer retailer. That is over 3 times bigger than the second biggest retailer, Adorama for whom we found 26 current offers for inkjet printers. The third biggest retailer is Overstock with 13 current inkjet printer offers.

When Are Most New Inkjets Released?

The most common period for new inkjet printers to be released in is between August and October. For the latest inkjet features you may want to consider waiting until August 2019. Also the price of the current inkjet printers may drop off just before the latest models are released in August. August was the biggest month last year for new inkjet printers, with 16 new inkjet printers released that month. In 2017 most new inkjet printers were released in March, with 10 new inkjet printers released that month. The biggest month in 2016 for new inkjet printer releases was October, with 26 new inkjets released that month.

How Fast Do Inkjet Prices Drop After Release?

On average inkjet printers drop in price by 31% in the first 6 months after release. That means that on a typical inkjet printer costing $405 you could save on average $126 by waiting 6 months before buying.

Print Speeds (Colour)

'Print Speed' measures how long it takes the inkjet printer to print a single colour A4 page at normal quality.

Comparing all inkjet printers, the print speeds (colour) range from 1ppm to 75ppm. The print speeds (colour) of most inkjets range from 1ppm to 7ppm. The inkjet printer with the fastest print speed (colour) is the HP PageWide Pro 750d, which is a 75ppm print speed (colour, normal quality, A4/US Le inkjet printer and is available at $1,195.00. The HP DesignJet T730, which currently retails for $2,000.00, has the slowest print speed (colour) and is a 1.36ppm print speed (colour, normal quality, A4/US Le inkjet printer.

Maximum Resolutions

Maximum printing resolution.

4800 x 1200 DPI is the most frequently found maximum resolution amongst new inkjets. We found 130 inkjets that are 4800 x 1200 DPI inkjets. The second most common maximum resolution amongst new inkjets is 5760 x 1440 DPI. We found 48 inkjets that are 5760 x 1440 DPI inkjet printers.

Wi-Fis

'Wi-Fi' denotes whether the laser printer has a support for wireless communications or not.

The vast majority of the 350 new inkjet printers currently listed on Kagoo are inkjet printers with a Wi-Fi. 295 out of 350 are inkjet printers with a Wi-Fi.

Which Are the Cheapest Retailers for Inkjets?

The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying inkjets. For each retailer it shows the total number of inkjets where they currently have a market leading price. The chart below helps you decide which retailer is normally cheapest for buying inkjet printers. For each retailer we took all of their prices and looked at what proportion of those prices where the cheapest on the market. The cheapest retailer that we found was eBay. 82 of their inkjet printer prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.

Proportion of Inkjets for Which Each Retailer is Cheapest?

Assessing how cheap each retailer is for inkjets by counting the number of cheapest prices for that retailer, makes the retailers that offer the greatest number of inkjet prices more likely to offer the greatest number of cheapest prices. The chart below considers the proportion of each retailer's inkjet prices that are the cheapest compared to other retailers. The cheapest retailer that we found using this approach was eBay. 94.3% of their inkjet prices were the cheapest that could be found anywhere.