Inkjet vs Laser: How to choose the right printer for you

We may be living in a largely paperless age, but there’s no escaping the fact that a printer is still an essential device to have in a home, small office, or business. The real question is only what type of printer you need, and how much you should spend on it. This guide will demystify two of the most popular printer types – inkjet and laser – and help you decide on a suitable one for your home or office.

What’s the difference between inkjet and laser printers?

Inkjet printer: These printers use ink cartridges to print text and images on paper. Here’s what you need to know about them:

1. They’re versatile with great colour accuracy and sharp text output

2. Low print speed

3. High cost per page

4. Low upfront cost

5. Cartridge refills are sometimes more expensive than the printer

6. Compact and lightweight designs

Laser printer: These printers are designed for fast, high-volume printing of documents.

1. High quality document prints but not suitable for photos or graphics-heavy designs

2. Very high print speed

3. Negligible per page

4. Higher upfront cost

5. Toner refills are expensive, but print volume is significantly higher

6. They tend to be larger and heavier than inkjets

ALSO READ: Explore 5 best mechanical keyboards

For home use (low volume)

If you want a printer for home use and don’t need to print more than a few pages per month, you should opt for an inkjet printer. Cost per page is high, but your initial investment is low and the versatility of having a printer that can handle graphics, photos, and documents will be more useful.

For home office or small business use (med-high volume)

A home office would generally require a higher volume of prints, and these would usually be documents. In such a case, a monochrome laser printer (single colour) would be ideal. The initial cost of the printer will be high, but you’ll get a few thousand pages per refill making it a more cost-effective option in the long run.

If you need to print on a letter-head and need the occasional colour graphics, it’s best to opt for a more expensive colour laser printer that will serve your needs better. You can’t print photos with such a printer, but colour documents will look great and print rapidly. This can be especially useful for small businesses that require some versatility in the prints, but also high volumes of prints.

Photographers and graphics designers

For high-quality photo and graphics prints, it’s best to go for a high-performance inkjet printer that’s specifically designed for photo printing. Where regular inkjet printers have two cartridges (black and colour), photo printers have four cartridges (cyan, magenta, yellow, and key). This gives far greater colour accuracy as well as greater flexibility when ordering refills. These refills tend to be very expensive, however, but this cost is expected given the quality of the prints.

Features to look out for, and those that can be ignored

Connectivity: Wi-Fi support is a must for any printer these days. You won’t need to rely on a dedicated PC to manage the printer, and you’ll have the flexibility to place the printer anywhere while printing from any device. USB connectivity is good to have in case of an emergency, however, as it tends to be more reliable. For Apple users, support for AirPrint will make life much easier.

Paper capacity: Inkjet printers tend to have smaller input and output trays – usually 50 pages – as print volumes are expected to be low. Laser printers usually have much larger trays that can hold 500 pages or more. The size of these trays also matters as it determines the dimensions of the paper you can use. All printers support A4 and Legal sizes, but if you want to print specialised formats such as envelopes, photos in 4×6” or 5×7”, or draft prints of a larger size, make sure you’re selecting a printer that can natively handle those formats.

ALSO READ: Best mouse for your desktops and laptops

Multifunction printers with scanners: Scanners are useful on printers that have a copy function. For digitising documents, it’d be far easier to use a document scanner app on your phone as the process is faster and much simpler. If you’re a photographer or an artist who needs high-resolution scans of graphics, photos, and film negatives, we’d strongly recommend a dedicated scanner.

Duplex printing: Duplex printing is where a printer prints on both sides of a paper. This is great for saving paper and also for reducing the mass of paper printed when printing a large number of pages.

All printers support manual duplex printing – which requires a user to move paper from the output tray to the input tray, and this is enough for home use and for low volume prints. Auto-duplex printing is generally available on more expensive laser printers and is recommended for small business or home office users who tend to print a large volume of documents.

Whether you’re setting up a printer for a home or a business, we hope this guide has helped you make a more informed decision for your printing needs.