Home Printers Shopping Guide

Something that you never realize is missing until you need it is a printer. We’ve all dealt with that one ticket that you need to print out to get into a concert or a return label that is stopping you from returning your online purchases.

Without a printer at home, you either have to print everything out at the office without the boss knowing, go to a print store, or put off your mailing for months and months until the return date expires.

We’ve all been there, but why? Why don’t we just stop inconveniencing ourselves and buy a printer?

It’s time you stop asking yourself that question and start finding a printer that makes those small, easy tasks doable and simple. No more of that “I need to email this to myself and print it at a print store.”

No. It’s time. You deserve to have your printer at home with you so you can print out whatever you need at a moment’s notice.

Printers That Do It All

One home appliance that we’ve underestimated for all these years is the home printer, and we’re here to put them back on the map. You spend all your time browsing online, making purchases, devising future itineraries, and working hard on your digital landscape.

You expect your printer to connect to your computer and print out documents with ease, but did you know that some printers can connect to your phone so you can print from an app? Printers in the 21st century get the job done with some added bonuses to keep your eye out for.

The best part? The price of printers has not hit an outrageous high. You can still get the essential functions of a printer that you need without paying an arm and a leg for one. Your printer can be smart and inexpensive at the same time, which is pretty rare when it comes to household items.

You can expect $100 to be the top of your budget for printers and still receive all the high-tech gadgets that a printer can offer.

Instant Ink

One of these smart features is instant ink replenishment, which orders ink automatically as soon as the printer’s sensor indicates that it's low.

Have you ever written a last-minute report at the dead of night, prepared the cover page and table of contents, only to find out you have NO ink left in your printer? And thanks to that morning deadline, you have to wake up even earlier to go to the print shop and put your report together.

So there you are, zombified at 7 am in the hustle and bustle of a print shop, hurriedly throwing together a massive report that you spent hours researching, writing, and proofreading. Honestly, we’re getting stressed just thinking about it.

Overall, that’s just not the ideal.

Ink replacement helps you avoid a last-minute, unexpected visit to the print shop. Rather than having to keep tabs on how much ink you’ve used, you can let your printer take the guesswork out of the printing game.

AirPrint and Connectivity

Another awesome feature that you can bet your 1990s printer doesn’t have is the ability to print straight from your phone or device without any cords or email exchanges.

Just like the AirDrop feature on an iPhone where you select the person you want to send photos to within close proximity, AirPrint needs no network, no wireless plan, and no complication to work.

Quiet Mode

Instead of waking the household up while you’re printing up your last-minute essay, printers come with a quiet mode that prints without a peep. If this is an important feature for you, or you share your printing space with more than one roommate, this usually doesn’t increase the price of a printer.

Size of the Printer

Perhaps one of the biggest decisions you’ll have to make when purchasing your home printer is the size of the space available for a new appliance.

Between compact printers and large-and-in-charge printers, you’ll always get a device that prints, but you might be cutting out the faxing or copying features that come with bigger sizes.

For the college student in a dorm or studio apartment, or even for someone who uses a printer for rare occasions, you can easily find a compact, simple, just-prints printer that delivers high-quality images quickly and easily.

Editor’s Choice

Based on the advances that home printers have made over the years, while also remaining reliable and hardy, we boiled our choices down to ten home printer picks that we know will get the job done.

While all of these are exceptional based on user reviews, performance, and features, our top pick is the HP OfficeJet 3830 All-in-One Wireless Printer.

Its compact profile means it can sit in just about any corner and still be a powerhouse. With 4 months of free ink with your sign-up of Instant Ink, as well as AirPrint capabilities, quiet mode, and 24/7 customer service access, HP hit it out of the park with this printer.

The HP OfficeJet 3830 has improved all the things that have made their classic printers excel over the years, bringing an updated, improved version straight to households everywhere. Plus, at only $100, you can get nearly every possible feature that a printer has to offer.

Compare and review our top ten home printers today, and start living the convenient office life straight from your home. Stop being a regular at your local print shop. Instead, start getting those one-touch, multi-page reports out while watching your favorite daytime dramas.