Top 6 Things to Look For In a Printer for Office Use

Are you searching for the perfect printer for office use? Most printer manufacturers have launched dozens of printers, which they claim are designed for office use. Given the sheer number of options available, it can be difficult to judge which convenience features or printer specs are really important.

Here in this post, we will discuss the top six things you should look for in a printer for office use. Read on.

1. Page Yield and Cost-Per-Print

Page yield is the measure of the total number of pages (with 5% coverage area) a cartridge can print before it runs out of ink or toner. When buying a printer for office use, be sure it uses high-yield (XL) or super-sized ink or toner cartridges.

Investing in low-cost printers that only use standard-size cartridges is one of the most common mistakes people make when buying printers. You don’t want to keep buying replacement ink cartridges every fortnight.

Many printers are shipped with standard cartridges and high-yield cartridges are optional. With high-capacity cartridges such as HP ink and toner cartridges, you can save a great deal on printing costs.

You can calculate the cost-per-print for a printer by dividing the total cost of one set of replacement cartridges by the page yield. In another post, we have compiled a selection of laser printers with the cheapest toner.

2. Print Resolution

Pay attention to the black and color print resolutions supported by the printer if the print quality is your priority number one.

Print resolution is generally measured in DPI or Dots Per Matrix. It’s essentially a measure of the total number of individual dots that can be printed on a span of one inch.

Entry-level inkjet and laser printers typically support 600x600 DPI Black and 1200x1200 DPI Black resolutions. Budget inkjet printers for office and home use generally support print-resolution as high as 4800x1200 DPI for color prints.

Do keep in mind that laser printers will print more legible and well-rounded text in B&W in comparison to most inkjet printers even when they support lower resolutions.

3. Print Speed

Print speed should be a serious concern if you need to print lengthy reports in office or frequently print invoices, short forms, etc. for customers.

How quickly a printer can produce prints is measured in Pages Per Minute or PPM. Printer specifications typically mention page speed for monochrome and color pages separately.

Entry-level inkjet and laser printers can print around 15 to 30 monochrome pages per minute. Print speeds are lower for color pages.

Laser printers are generally faster than their inkjet counterparts but the inkjet technology is fast catching up. Read our guide on how to decide between a laser and an inkjet printer for more information.

4. Duplex Printing

Do you need to print on both sides of a sheet of paper? If yes, you need to invest in a printer that supports duplex printing or you will have to manually turn each page to print on both sides. It’s frustrating and highly time-consuming. Many entry-level AIOs do not have this feature.

5. Automatic Document Feeder (ADF)

The ADF takes several sheets and feeds one sheet at a time into the device for printing, copying, or scanning. This way, you can process multi-page documents with great ease, without having to manually replace each sheet.

Document feeders in printers can have two types of duplex scanning capabilities – RADF and DADF.

Reverse ADF) scans one side of a sheet and then flips it to scan the other side. DADF (Duplex ADF), on the other hand, scans both sides of a sheet at one go.

It is also important to note the total number of sheets the document feeder can hold at one time.

Most of the printers designed for professional use will have this feature.

6. Connectivity Options

Do you have an office IT network where peripheral devices are shared amongst all employees? Do your employees need to print directly from their smartphones? Do you want a printer that can print from (or scan to) a thumb drive?

Most printers available these days support mobile and cloud printing and have Ethernet and Wireless connectivity options. But, be sure to avoid making assumptions. Many printers do not have Ethernet or Wi-Fi.

You need to make sure the printer you intend to buy for office use has at least one or two connectivity features that you need the most.

Final Words

When you think it’s time to replace an old printer, it’s advisable to spend some time analyzing your current and future needs before you make a purchase decision. Besides the things discussed above, you may also want to consider different paper-sizes supported by a printer, availability of a touchscreen, and whether the device can print borderless images.

Also read: How to choose the best printer for your small business.