The best wireless printers allow you to print from any device without having to directly connect via USB or Ethernet, making it easier to print from your PC, laptop, or smartphone.
Given the fact that a lot of folks are now working at home following the pandemic and beyond the lock down, having wireless connectivity on a printer is now a must have feature to allow more than one computer to connect and print.
All of the wireless printers in this guide come with either Wi-Fi or Bluetooth connectivity (and often both), which makes them incredibly flexible devices that are easy to install in any home or modern office.
Some even add NFC (near field communication) connectivity for tap-to-connect convenience with compatible mobile clients.
Because they don’t need to be connected to a PC or router with wires, you can place them pretty much anywhere – as long as there’s a power socket and decent Wi-Fi connection. Of course, it also means you can print from any device and from anywhere that connects with your printer.
By being connected to your network – albeit wirelessly – the best wireless printers benefit from advanced network features as well. If you have a small network, for example, every PC connected to your network can print to them, making them ideal for businesses. Many even allow you to scan and email documents directly from the wireless printer itself.
So, we’ve put together a list of the best wireless printers currently available, alongside our own price comparison tool so you’re also getting the best available deal.
Best wireless printers: How did we test them?
Each wireless printer we source for testing is measured on our test bench and the results are critically compared with every other model we have reviewed. Rather than relying on the manufacturer’s quoted figures, we time the first page out and print speeds in single sheet and duplex mode using a standard ten-page document and a stopwatch app.
To compare print quality, we print out the same set of test documents on every machine. These twelve test pages include text of varying font sizes and colors, mixed image and text pages, a set of photos and a series of test patterns designed to assess sharpness, color fidelity, contrast and grey scale.
We also calculate running costs, compare functionality and consider each product’s versatility, design and build quality. The overall score reflects all of these parameters and overall value for money.
The best wireless printer 2021 are…
The HP OfficeJet Pro 8035e (known as OfficeJet Pro 8025 in the UK) looks slick with its blue detailing and small enough to sit on a desk in a home office. It is also has excellent wireless connectivity with self-healing Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi Direct and Bluetooth all built in. This makes it particularly easy to connect a mobile device for cloud printing using AirPrint, or Google Cloud Print. You can even yell at your printer to make it work thanks to its compatibility with Alexa voice commands. With a fairly fast print speed, a large paper tray and user-friendly touchscreen controls, there’s a lot to like about this competent all-in-one.
Read the full review: HP OfficeJet Pro 8025
With all the functionality a small business could need, this feature-packed inkjet can do anything from sending a fax, to saving a scan to the cloud. Most surprisingly, given its A4-size footprint, is its ability to print on A3 paper. Wi-Fi is built in and Brother’s companion iOS/Android app makes wireless printing a breeze. It prints clearly in monochrome, while colour photos look quite vibrant on photo paper. The touchscreen is rather small and it’s not as fast as a laser printer, but it strikes a good balance between performance and features.
The Brother MFC-J895DW (known as the MFC-J890DW in UK) is a four-in-one inkjet printer aimed at the home or small office and for the money, it is remarkably well equipped. As you would expect, it can duplex print, photocopy and scan at a respectable image quality, but it is also especially well catered for in the wireless department. In addition to Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi Direct connectivity, it also offers NFC tap-to-connect, which means you can connect your NFC-enabled smart phone to this printer by simply touching the two together.
The HP Envy Pro 6420 is a compact and inexpensive inkjet with all the features you could ask for from a home office printer. It can print, scan, copy and even fax via your smartphone. The print speed is slow, but it can auto duplex print or photocopy a stack of up to 35 pages with its inbuilt ADF (automatic document scanner). Instead of an Ethernet port, you have both Bluetooth and self-healing Wi-Fi built in, making mobile printing via HP’s iOS/Android app particularly easy.
This satisfyingly small and attractively designed all-in-one inkjet offers everything you are likely to need in your home office. It can print and scan at a high enough resolution to provide crisp and accurate colour photocopies using five inkjet cartridges instead of the usual four. The extra one is a pigment black, for more durable mono prints. It’s also blessed with a touchscreen interface and not only Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi Direct connectivity, but Bluetooth as well.
Duplex A3 printing is not something many affordable inkjet printers can manage, but this capable device does it well and it can hold a whole ream of paper in its dual paper trays. It also boasts Wi-Fi Direct and NFC connectivity for making a quick wireless connection and printing via your smartphone. It’s a pity the supplied Epson Durabright startup ink cartridges are rather limiting, but when you switch to XL capacity replacements it becomes more economical to run. It certainly has a high capacity for paper with room for a whole ream on board.
Brother has endowed this hefty laser printer with all the features a small business might need. It can hold 300 sheets of paper and turn out mono or colour pages at the rate of 31 per minute. There’s a fax facility and electronic document feed for automated tasks. It also makes wireless printing from a mobile device, or scanning documents to the cloud very easy using its built in Wi-Fi and a slick iOS/Android companion app. Both Google Cloud Cloud and AirPrint are covered.
Laser printers tend to be a lot larger than their inkjet cousins, but HP has turned that on its head with this toaster-sized device. It can only print single-side mono pages, but it can do it more quickly and economically than most inkjets and it’s small enough to carry around with you. You can connect via Wi-Fi, or Wi-Fi direct for wireless printing via AirPrint, or Google Cloud Print. The slick iOS/Android app by HP can help you with this.
At less than £40 (around $52), this three-in-one printer is something of a steal. Of course the catch comes with the relatively high price of the inkjet cartridges, but if you take out HP’s Instant Ink subscription, even this cost drops. The printer itself is rather flimsy, but it’s well kitted out with Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi Direct built in for easy wireless access via the rather good HP companion app.
Epson’s conveniently compact three-in-one printer includes useful features like an SD Card slot, duplex printing and Wi-Fi Direct (as well as Wi-Fi) at a very reasonable price point. Expensive inkjet cartridges make it uneconomical for the busy office, but for occasional use, this is a very easy and reliable wireless printer that can turn out black and white pages surprisingly quickly.
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