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This guide picks eight printers and prices each per page. From the makers' own ink prices and ISO page yields, a black page costs from 0.2p on Epson EcoTank bottles to 14p on Canon's standard PG-575 cartridge. None of the 32 document printer listings in Amazon UK's top 50 on 15 September 2026 gives a cost per page.
- A black page costs from 0.2p (Epson EcoTank) to 14p (Canon standard PG-575 cartridge).
- For light printing: Canon PIXMA TS3750i, 6.9p a black page on XL cartridges.
- Over about 50 pages a month: Brother HL-L2400DW laser at 3.0p a page, or Epson EcoTank ET-2861 at 0.21p.
- None of 32 listings gives a cost per page. Look Into calls this the pence-per-page blank.
The cheapest printer to buy is usually the dearest to run, because the ink costs so much. This page works out what each printed page costs. If you print more than about 50 pages a month, a laser or a refillable tank printer costs less over time.
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The short version
- Of the 50 bestselling printers on Amazon UK on 15 September 2026, 32 are document printers. None of the 32 listings gives a cost per page. Eight give a page yield, and none of those names the ISO test behind it. We call this the pence-per-page blank.
- Nine of the 32 put "up to 3 years of ink" in the title. None of the nine says how many pages a month that assumes.
- From the makers' own ink prices and ISO page yields, a black page costs from 0.2p (Epson EcoTank bottles) to 14p (Canon's standard PG-575 cartridge).
- The cheapest printer to buy is not the cheapest to run. At 50 black pages a month, the £179 Epson ET-2861 overtakes the £34.99 Canon TS3750i after about 2,100 pages, which is 42 months. At 20 pages a month it takes almost nine years.
- Over 1,800 black pages, three years at 50 a month, the Brother HL-L2400DW laser is the cheapest pick here at £132.89 including the printer.
Printer listings sell the box. The cost of printing sits somewhere else: on a cartridge page, in a subscription plan, or in a footnote on the maker's own website.
So this guide prices the page. For each pick we took the maker's UK price for its replacement ink or toner, divided it by the maker's own page yield, and set the result beside the Amazon price of the printer on 15 September 2026.
The short answer
For light printing, the Canon PIXMA TS3750i at £34.99 is the cheapest to buy and costs 6.9p a black page on XL cartridges. If you print more than about 50 pages a month, the Brother HL-L2400DW laser (£99.59, 3.0p a page) or the Epson EcoTank ET-2861 (£179.00, 0.21p a page, with 4,500 black pages of ink in the box) cost less over three years. No printer listing we read on Amazon UK states a cost per page.
How this page was made
Prices and specs last checked by Look Into on 15 September 2026 · next check 1 December 2026 · how we picked
How Look Into made this guide: desk research, not a hands-on test. We have not printed on any of these machines. Printer prices are Amazon UK on 15 September 2026. Ink and toner prices and page yields come from Canon, Epson, HP and Brother's own UK pages, except where the table says Amazon. Electricity uses the Ofgem cap of 26.32p per kWh that applies from 1 October 2026.
Black Friday 2026 is Friday 27 November, and Amazon's sale runs from 19 to 30 November. A printer deal is only a deal if the ink is. A black page costs from 0.2p to 14p depending on the ink system, so work out the cost per page before you look at the discount. Cheap inkjets are one of the ten Black Friday deals we would think twice about. Check any crossed-out price with our free deal checker, and see the dates and the rules on the Black Friday 2026 page.
LookInto awards in this guide
Epson EcoTank ET-2861
The box holds 4,500 black and 7,500 colour pages of ink. Ink tank, A4, print, scan and copy, Wi-Fi.
£189.90
Check price on Amazon
Affiliate links: as an Amazon Associate, Look Into earns from qualifying purchases. Prices change. These labels are Look Into editorial picks from desk research, not test results and not awards from Amazon or any third party. How we pick · See every LookInto Winner.
Which printer should I buy? Pick by what you print
For most UK homes the cheapest printer to own is decided by the cost per page, not the price on the box. Using each maker's page yield and cartridge price:
- Cheapest ink per page: Epson EcoTank ET-2861, 0.21p per black page. It costs more to buy, so it pays off only if you print regularly.
- Cheapest overall for 1,800 black pages, printer included: Brother HL-L2400DW mono laser, 3.0p a page and two-sided printing. Black only.
- Cheapest cartridge inkjet to run: Epson Expression Home XP-2200, 6.8p per black page.
- Photos and colour: Canon PIXMA TS7750i, the photo inkjet here, at 9.2p per black page.
- Low-volume black printing on a laser: HP LaserJet M110w, 5.2p per page.
Buying in the Black Friday sales? A cut on a printer with dear cartridges can be cancelled out within a few hundred pages, so compare cost per page first, then check the sale price with our deal checker.
How they compare
| Printer | Type | Amazon price, 15 Sep 2026 | Black ink or toner | Maker's page yield | Price of that cartridge | Cost per black page | 1,800 black pages, printer included |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Canon PIXMA TS3750i | Cartridge inkjet | £34.99 | PG-575XL | 400 pages | £27.49 (Canon) | 6.9p | £158.69 |
| HP DeskJet 2922 | Cartridge inkjet | £44.00 | HP 308e | 320 pages | £25.99 (Amazon) | 8.1p | £190.19 |
| Epson Expression Home XP-2200 | Cartridge inkjet | £44.99 | 604XL | 500 pages | £33.99 (Epson) | 6.8p | £167.35 |
| Canon PIXMA TS7750i | Cartridge inkjet, photo | £86.32 | PG-585XL | 300 pages | £27.49 (Canon) | 9.2p | £251.26 |
| HP LaserJet M110w | Mono laser | £74.97 | HP 142A | 950 pages | £48.96 (Amazon) | 5.2p | £152.28 |
| Brother HL-L2400DW | Mono laser, two-sided | £99.59 | TN-2510XL | 3,000 pages | £90.82 (Amazon) | 3.0p | £132.89 |
| Epson EcoTank ET-2861 | Ink tank | £179.00 | 104 black bottle | 4,500 pages | £9.45 (Epson, promotion) | 0.21p | £179.00 |
| Epson EcoTank ET-2950 | Ink tank | £254.99 | 102 black bottle | 7,500 pages | £14.85 (Epson, promotion) | 0.20p | £254.99 |
The last column adds the printer to the ink needed for 1,800 black pages. For the two lasers and the two tanks it counts the starter toner or ink the maker says is in the box: about 300 pages for the HP laser, 700 for the Brother, 4,500 for the ET-2861 and 8,500 for the ET-2950. The makers of the four cartridge inkjets did not state a starter yield on the pages we read, so we counted none. That flatters the tanks and lasers slightly less than it might.
Page yields are the makers' own figures from standard ISO test pages (ISO/IEC 24711 for ink, 19752 for toner, where the maker names it). Real documents with more text or pictures use more.
The pence-per-page blank
We read the 50 bestselling printers on Amazon UK on 15 September 2026: title, bullet points, product details, the maker's A+ content and the description. Eighteen were label, receipt, tattoo-stencil or pocket photo printers, which leaves 32 document printers from Canon, Epson, HP and Brother.
None of the 32 gives a cost per page. Eight state a page yield of some kind, usually for the ink in the box. None of the eight names the test behind that yield. And none of the 32 states how much electricity the printer uses: a search for watts found four hits, and all four were the letter W for width in the dimensions.
That is the pence-per-page blank: the one number that decides what a printer costs you, left off the page that sells it. The makers do publish the pieces. They are just on different pages.
Up to three years of ink, but whose three years?
Nine of the 32 listings, all Epson EcoTank or HP Smart Tank models, put "up to 3 years of ink" in the title. We searched each of the nine for a monthly page count, an average or a basis. None gives one on the Amazon page.
The ink itself is generous. Epson says the ET-2861's bottles print up to 4,500 black and 7,500 colour pages. Whether that is three years depends entirely on how much you print, and the listing does not say what it assumed. At 50 black pages a month, 4,500 pages is seven and a half years. At 150 a month, it is two and a half.
When an ink tank pays for itself
An ink tank costs more to buy and far less to run. The question is when the two lines cross.
Against the Canon TS3750i on XL cartridges, the Epson ET-2861 costs £144.01 more up front and saves about 6.7p on every black page. It pulls ahead after roughly 2,100 black pages. That is 42 months at 50 pages a month, 21 months at 100, and almost nine years at 20.
The Brother laser crosses the Canon sooner, after about 1,130 pages, because its starter toner covers the first 700. It then stays ahead of the ET-2861 until about 3,300 pages. If you print mostly black text, a mono laser is the cheaper middle ground.
Subscriptions: when the plan beats the cartridge
All four makers now sell ink by the month. On 15 September 2026, HP Instant Ink was £4.49 for 50 pages a month, 9.0p a page, colour or black. Canon's PIXMA Print Plan was £3.99 for 60 pages (6.7p), but only for listed models, which include the TS7750i. Epson ReadyPrint Flex was £4.49 for 50 pages. Brother EcoPro started at £1.99 for 50 pages a month on mono lasers.
A plan wins if you print colour, because a colour page on cartridges costs more than a black one. It loses if you print less than the plan allows, although all four let you roll some unused pages over.
The catch is on HP's own pages. HP says its HP+ models need an HP account, an internet connection and "the use of only Original HP ink for the life of the printer". The DeskJet 2922 page says an HP account is required for full functionality, and that the printer uses dynamic security measures to block cartridges with non-HP chips. Of the 14 HP printers in the top 50, two mention dynamic security on their Amazon listing.
What a printer costs to leave on
Printers spend most of their lives asleep. Where the maker publishes a typical weekly figure (TEC), we priced it at 26.32p per kWh: the Epson ET-2861 uses 0.15 kWh a week, about £2.05 a year; the HP LaserJet M110w 0.239 kWh, about £3.27; the Brother HL-L2400DW 0.34 kWh, about £4.65.
The inkjets publish standby watts instead. Canon's TS3750i draws about 1.3W on standby with everything connected, which is about £3.00 a year if it is never switched off. Epson's XP-2200 draws 0.8W asleep, about £1.84 a year. Neither figure is large, and neither is on the Amazon listing.
The picks
Ranked from cheapest to buy to dearest. Prices are Amazon UK on 15 September 2026 and move often.
Canon PIXMA TS3750i
Cheapest to buyThe number one printer on Amazon UK on the day, at £34.99. It prints, scans and copies over Wi-Fi. On Canon's XL cartridges a black page costs 6.9p and a colour page 9.2p.
The catch: Canon's standard PG-575 black costs £13.99 for 100 pages, which is 14p a page, twice the XL rate. Buy XL, or the cheap printer gets expensive quickly.
Inkjet, A4, print, scan and copy, Wi-Fi. PG-575XL 400 pages, CL-576XL 300 pages (ISO/IEC 24711). Standby about 1.3W.
Evidence: Canon UK specifications and Canon UK store prices, read 15 September 2026. Canon does not say how many pages the cartridges in the box print.
As an Amazon Associate, Look Into earns from qualifying purchases. Product prices and availability are accurate as of 14 November 2026 5:46 pm and are subject to change.
