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You can print for years without a second thought, or you can wince every time a cartridge runs dry — the machine decides which one you get. The printer is rarely the expensive part; the ink is. If you have ever paid more for one replacement cartridge than you paid for the printer holding it, you already know the problem.
I’m Mo Maruf — the founder and writer behind The Tools Trunk. This guide is built by comparing the manufacturers’ published specifications and the patterns across verified customer reviews, so you get each pick’s real strengths and trade-offs instead of marketing spin.
The picks below are sorted by what actually matters — how cheap the ink stays over years, how fast pages come out, and how reliably each machine connects. Every entry earns its place as a cheap printer with cheap ink for real households.
Our Picks at a Glance
How To Choose The Best Cheap Printer With Cheap Ink
Buyers pick a printer by the sticker on the box, then pay for that choice every month in ink. A cheap machine with pricey cartridges can cost you more across a year than a pricier tank model. Here is what actually moves the needle.
Tank or cartridge — the decision that matters most
A refillable ink tank printer holds ink in built-in reservoirs you top up from bottles. So there is no cartridge to swap and no chip to reset. The tank models here ship with enough ink for thousands of pages, which is why they win on long-run cost. Cartridge models stay cheaper up front, but you pay per cartridge — and on some, one color running dry means tossing a cartridge that still holds the other colors.
Print speed you can actually feel
Pages per minute, or ppm, tells you how fast black text pages come out in steady printing. A machine rated at 16 ppm finishes a ten-page document in well under a minute. A 10 ppm machine takes noticeably longer on the same job. Color ppm is almost always lower than black, so check both numbers if you print photos or color homework.
Duplex, ADF, and paper capacity
Automatic duplex means the printer flips the page itself for two-sided printing, saving paper and your hands. An automatic document feeder, or ADF, pulls a stack of originals through for scanning and copying. So you are not lifting the lid for every sheet. Paper tray capacity decides how often you refill — a 150-sheet tray means far fewer reloads than a 100-sheet one.
Quick Comparison
Every printer here uses a low-cost ink system — either cartridges or a refillable tank. The specs below are the three that decide your day-to-day experience: raw print speed, the ink setup, and whether it handles two-sided printing on its own.
| Model | Best For | Black Speed | Ink System | Duplex | Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brother Work Smart 1360 (MFC-J1360DW)★ Best Overall | Everyday all-in-one value | 16 ppm | Cartridges | Automatic | Amazon |
| Canon PIXMA TR7120Most Compact | Compact home and hybrid work | 14 ppm | 2-cartridge hybrid | Automatic | Amazon |
| Canon PIXMA TR4720 | Fax plus printing at home | — | PG-275 / CL-276 cartridges | Automatic | Amazon |
| Brother INKvestment 1365 (MFC-J1365DW) | High-yield cartridges, low swaps | 16 ppm | High-yield cartridges | Automatic | Amazon |
| Epson EcoTank ET-2988 | Years of ink, lowest upkeep | 15 ppm | Refillable tank | Automatic | Amazon |
| HP Smart Tank 5003 | Home, students, crafts | 10 ppm | Refillable tank | Manual | Amazon |
| HP Smart Tank 5103 | Photo-friendly light printing | 12 ppm | Refillable tank | Manual | Amazon |
In‑Depth Reviews
1. Brother Work Smart 1360 Wireless Color Inkjet All-in-One (MFC-J1360DW)
The all-in-one that runs on any brand of cartridge — no chip lock-in, no brand tax.
This Brother takes the top spot because it prints black text at 16 pages per minute (the fastest black speed in this lineup) — a 14 percent lead over the Canon PIXMA TR7120’s 14 ppm. On a real job, a ten-page form set finishes in roughly forty seconds instead of a full minute of churning.
The headline for cheap-ink buyers: this machine takes Brother cartridges and other brands too. So nobody forces you into one price tier. It also carries a 20-sheet single-sided automatic document feeder (a tray that pulls a stack of originals through on its own) plus a 150-sheet paper tray. A big scanning session then does not turn into lid-lifting busywork. Setup is genuinely mixed — the app and the on-screen menu split opinion, and the 1.8-inch color display is small enough that typing a Wi-Fi password on it tests your patience. Wired USB is the fallback that always works.
Buyers praise print quality most of all — clean, everyday documents with no fuss. The recurring honest gripe is running cost at the cartridge end. One report puts realistic ink life near 100 pages per cartridge with ink-saving mode on, and noticeably faster burn without it. This is also the higher-scored pick in this head-to-head: it holds 3.8 stars across 2,500+ ratings, while the reviewer-favorite budget route sits below it on score.
What earns it the top spot
- 16 ppm black — the quickest text speed here
- 20-sheet ADF and 150-sheet tray for real paperwork volume
- Takes Brother and third-party cartridges, so no brand lock-in
- Automatic duplex printing built in
Where it asks for patience
- Setup is the most criticized part — mixed based on the platform’s own customers-say summary
- 1.8-inch screen is cramped for entering a Wi-Fi password
- Ink burn at the cartridge end can be fast if you do not run ink-saving mode
- Cheaper plastic build than the tank models
Buy it if: you want a full four-function machine, a document feeder, and freedom to buy whatever cartridge brand is cheapest that month.
Walk past it if: you print hundreds of pages a month — a refillable tank will save you far more on ink.
2. Canon PIXMA TR7120 Wireless Color Inkjet Printer
A tidy two-cartridge all-in-one that slips onto a shelf and prints without drama.
Dual-band Wi-Fi sets this Canon apart: it runs on 2.4GHz or 5GHz, so it holds its connection on a crowded home network better than single-band machines like the Brother Work Smart 1360. It prints at 14 pages per minute in black and uses a 2-cartridge hybrid ink system — one black tank plus one combined color cartridge — which keeps replacement simple.
Owners love the print quality most, and it is the top-rated strength here — 118 mentions under the platform’s own aspect tally. Setup is right behind it and equally well received. The machine prints, scans, and copies, and it handles multi-page originals with its auto document feeder. You also get a 1.42-inch monochrome OLED screen for checking ink levels and status. The compact footprint and tidy white shell make it easy to live with in a small space.
The one honest trade-off is the hybrid color cartridge. If your cyan runs dry, you replace the whole color cartridge even if magenta and yellow still hold ink. That is the price of the simpler setup. This is a small-model printer built for home and hybrid-work volume rather than a print shop — that is the fit, not a fault.
Who it is built for: a home office or hybrid worker who wants an all-in-one that does not eat desk space and connects reliably on 5GHz Wi-Fi.
Small carry-limit to know: the combined color cartridge means replacing colors together — plan for slightly more frequent cartridge buys than a four-tank system.
Reach for this one: when desk space and dependable dual-band Wi-Fi matter more than raw speed.
Leave it if: you want zero cartridge waste — the tank models below let you top up each color separately.
3. Canon PIXMA TR4720 All-in-One Wireless Printer
The one printer here with a fax — the exact feature a therapy practice or clinic front desk still calls about.
This is the only printer here that faxes, and that single feature keeps it on the list. It prints, copies, scans, and faxes, and it comes with the RJ-11 telephone/modem cable in the box so you can wire it straight to a landline. It runs on Canon’s PG-275 black and CL-276 color cartridges, which you load through a clearly laid out ink access door, and setup is handled by the Canon PRINT app.
Color output tops out at 4800 x 1200 dpi (dots per inch, the measure of how finely the print head places ink) and black copies at 1200, so a photo or a color handout comes out sharp. The printer does fine on documents too. Automatic duplex flips pages for two-sided output, so a two-page handout uses one sheet. The honest caveat: this is a compact home machine, not a heavy-volume printer. One reviewer found the ink ran out fairly quickly and suggested sizing up if you print a lot. A single report of a unit failing after a few uses is note, but it is an outlier, not a pattern.
For a low-volume household that occasionally needs to send a fax or scan a form to an ADF (an auto document feeder, which pulls originals through on its own), this is the practical pick. It is a straightforward home-and-small-business printer with cheap cartridges and a feature set that covers the rare jobs.
Match it to: a remote worker or small business that faxes or scans documents and prints light-color pages in a pinch.
Not your machine if: you print dense, hundreds-of-pages volume — a tank model is the smarter ink ceiling.
4. Brother INKvestment 1365 Wireless Color Inkjet All-in-One (MFC-J1365DW)
Extra-large cartridges that stretch past a year of home use — without the tank-printer hassle.
The box holds a 1,200-page black cartridge plus 500-page cyan, magenta, and yellow cartridges — about a year of home printing before you buy ink. It prints at 16 pages per minute black and 9 ppm color, and it carries a 150-sheet tray plus a 20-sheet automatic document feeder. In this lineup it is the middle lane: cheaper to run than a standard cartridge model, less fuss than a tank.
The real draw is the ink cadence: owners say the cartridges last a long stretch, with one estimate landing near a year of home use. Brother also adds Wi-Fi Direct, which lets your laptop or phone print straight to it with no home network involved — handy in a router-dead corner. The 1.8-inch color display handles cloud app access to Google Drive, Dropbox, Box, and OneDrive.
Setup is the friction point, and honestly so. One owner spent over an hour on the phone trying to connect a Mac, tangled in a mandatory password and a small screen. So budget a calm thirty minutes, or download the Brother Mobile Connect app before you start. The reward is a machine that swaps cartridges far less often than a standard cartridge model.
The purchase case: a household printing a steady volume that hates replacing cartridges and wants a middle lane between cheap cartridges and a full tank system.
Honest friction: the setup path favors Wi-Fi and the Brother app, so have your network password handy and a wired USB cable as backup.
Pick this when: you want more pages per cartridge than a standard inkjet without committing to a refill routine.
Think again if: your printing is genuinely heavy — the EcoTank tank model further down is the lower-maintenance ceiling.
5. Epson EcoTank ET-2988 Wireless All-in-One Color Supertank Printer
Enough ink in the box for thousands of pages — and it tops up from keyed bottles, no cartridge at all.
It ships with enough ink for up to 6,600 black pages and 5,500 color pages, and each replacement bottle set equals roughly 80 cartridges. You refill from uniquely keyed EcoFit bottles (each color fits only its own port), so there is no mixing up cyan and magenta and no squeezing or spillage — unlike the cartridge models above.
At 11.5 pounds it is genuinely light enough to move one-handed, and its 4800 x 1200 dpi print resolution (dots per inch — how finely the head places ink) is high enough for real photo work. It runs at 15 pages per minute black and 8 ppm color with zero warmup time, and it carries a 100-sheet tray plus automatic duplex printing. A 1.44-inch color screen handles navigation. Print quality is the top positive here — Quality leads the aspects list with 23 mentions.
The honest catch is connectivity: several buyers report the wireless link dropping and needing driver gymnastics to reconnect. Print quality is also mixed at the aspect level — most are happy, but a few report weak colors. This is a renewed unit, so check the condition guarantee, and lean on USB when Wi-Fi misbehaves.
Why the tank wins on cost
- Up to 6,600 black / 5,500 color pages of ink in the box
- Refill bottles equal about 80 cartridges each
- Keyed EcoFit bottles prevent color mix-ups
- 4800 x 1200 dpi for sharp photos and text
What to watch for
- Wireless connection can drop and need reinstallation
- Print quality is mixed at the aspect level — a few unclear prints reported
- It is a renewed unit, so verify the seller’s condition terms
- Only a 100-sheet tray, smaller than the Brother models
Right for you if: you print steadily across the year and want the lowest ongoing ink cost with virtually no cartridge shopping.
Second-guess it if: your home Wi-Fi is already flaky — the connectivity is the most-mentioned weak spot.
6. HP Smart Tank 5003 Wireless All-in-One Ink Tank Printer
Three years of ink from the start — a family printer that barely asks you to think about refills.
The box includes up to 3 years of ink — up to 6,000 color or black pages — so a family printing homework and forms rarely buys a refill. The tank is cartridge-free: you plug the ink bottles in and let them drain, with no squeezing or spillage. It handles print, copy, and scan plus borderless prints, mobile, and wireless printing, and it prints at 10 pages per minute black and 5 ppm color.
Setup is a genuine strong point — described as quick and easy across the reviews, with the wireless phone printing singled out as convenient. Print quality is crisp and clean for everyday documents. It runs a 14.23-inch-deep footprint that favors a desk rather than a shelf, and the ink tank system is easy to monitor.
Be honest about speed, though. This is not the machine for an impatient office: several owners note it takes longer per page, and one verdict put a single photo near five minutes and a text document near two. That is the trade-off for the enormous ink-savings posture. For a home that prints a handful of pages a day, the slow cadence barely registers.
The everyday fit: families, students, and light craft printers who care far more about not buying ink than about printing fast.
The honest speed limit: if you routinely print large batches, the slow output will test you — the Brother or Epson models move quicker.
Reach for it if: you want refillable ink you can set up once and forget for years.
skip it if: you print for an office on a clock — the page speed is the most-mentioned drawback.
7. HP Smart Tank 5103 Wireless All-in-One Ink Tank Printer
A cartridge-free tank that throws in a hundred sheets of photo paper and two years of ink.
Pick this one for photos: the box bundles up to 2 years of ink — around 6,000 color or black pages — plus 100 sheets of HP Everyday Photo Paper. The refill system matches the Smart Tank 5003: plug the bottles into cartridge-free tanks and let them drain, with the black bottle rated about 6,000 pages and each color about 8,000.
Print quality is the standout — sharp, crisp output is what earns it the top positive aspect. It also prints at 12 pages per minute black and 5 ppm color, runs a 24-bit color depth for smooth photo gradients, and lets you print borderless. HP AI is built in to reformat web pages and emails so you do not waste pages on awkward layouts. The white, streamlined body tucks away neatly when not in use.
Now the honest part: this is the most polarizing pick on the list. Print quality is praised, but the machine’s overall quality reads as mixed on the platform’s aspect tally, and there are real reports of slow printing and unreliability after some months — one owner called it the worst printer they have owned, while many others are entirely happy with clear, sharp results. Connectivity is the most-mentioned weak spot. If you print photos casually and tolerate manual duplex (this one flips both sides yourself, unlike the automatic-duplex picks above), it is a great fit. If you want bulletproof, buy-the-EcoTank instead.
Where it shines: the photo paper bundle and 24-bit color depth make it a friendly intro to at-home photo printing.
The trade to accept: manual duplex and mixed long-term reliability reports — treat it as a light-use printer.
Get this if: you want tank-based cheap ink plus a photo-paper starter kit and the HP AI layout cleanup.
Consider a different tank if: you need automatic double-sided printing or a tighter reliability record.
Understanding the Specs
Pages Per Minute (ppm)
Pages per minute measures how fast a printer lays down black text in steady printing — a 16 ppm machine is faster than a 14 ppm machine on the same document. So a ten-page packet leaves the tray sooner. Color ppm is nearly always lower, so check both numbers if you print photos or color work. A 5 ppm color rating means a color-heavy page takes roughly twice as long as a black text page at the same setting.
Ink System: Tank vs Cartridge
A refillable tank holds ink in built-in reservoirs you top up from bottles, so there is no cartridge to swap and no waste when one color runs dry. A cartridge system uses sealed ink units — cheaper up front, but on some models you discard a whole color cartridge when only one color is spent. Tank models ship with enough ink for thousands of pages; cartridge models trade higher per-page cost for lower upfront cost.
Automatic Duplex Printing
Automatic duplex means the printer flips the sheet itself so you get two-sided output without touching the paper. Manual duplex (found on the HP Smart Tank models here) means you turn the stack over yourself. If you print lots of two-sided documents, automatic duplex saves real time and paper.
Connection: USB, Wi-Fi, and Wi-Fi Direct
USB is the reliable fallback that almost never drops. Wi-Fi lets you print from phones and laptops anywhere in the house — dual-band 2.4GHz/5GHz handles crowded networks better than a single band. Wi-Fi Direct lets a device talk straight to the printer with no network in between, handy in a weak-signal corner.
FAQ
Is a tank printer or a cartridge printer actually cheaper on ink over time?
Will cheap third-party cartridges work in the Brother MFC-J1360DW?
How many pages can I print before the tank runs out?
Can I fax a document from a home inkjet printer?
Which of these printers has automatic two-sided printing?
Do I need a Wi-Fi connection to set up these printers?
How many pages per minute is fast enough for a home office?
What is the difference between the HP Smart Tank 5003 and the 5103?
Can these printers scan a stack of documents at once?
How do I connect one of these printers to my iPhone or MacBook?
Final Thoughts: The Verdict
For most buyers, the cheap printer with cheap ink winner is the Brother Work Smart 1360 (MFC-J1360DW). It gives you the fastest black-text speed in this lineup at 16 ppm, a document feeder, a 150-sheet tray, and freedom to buy whichever budget cartridge brand is cheapest. If your true goal is the lowest ink cost across years of printing, the Epson EcoTank ET-2988 with its refillable tank ends the cartridge treadmill. And for families who want a refillable tank that ships with years of ink and a photo-paper starter kit, the HP Smart Tank 5103 is the pick — just plan for manual duplex. One honest nudge: whichever you choose, buy it because the ink math fits your volume, not because the box was cheap.
How We Picked
We do not accept paid placement. Every pick is matched to a real buyer and a real use-case; we do not hands-on test units.
Sources & Methodology
Specifications: manufacturer listings and product documentation. Review insights: verified customer reviews, as of September 2026. Pricing: not shown on this page (it changes often); check the current price via the retailer link.
As an Amazon Associate, The Tools Trunk earns from qualifying purchases. This does not affect which products we feature.