Best budget wireless laser printers on the market
So what do we consider the best budget wireless laser printer on the market? Read on and we hope to help you in narrowing down what the best cheap wireless laser printer is for you and your needs.
Throughout history laser printers were synonymous with high price. With advancing technology and more customers the price of laser jet printers has fallen greatly. This is good news for students, small businesses, or even just casual users as the price point now makes it affordable to most consumers.
So if you are in the market for a new wireless laser printer keep in mind you don’t need to spend a fortune anymore. After extensive research we have selected the best monochrome and color wireless laser printers on the market. Therefore just read our reviews on the best budget wireless laser printers and choose the one that best fits your needs. We tried keeping the products selected under $200 but technology changes rapidly and some items could be a tad more.
Finding the best budget wireless laser printer buyers guide:
Laser printers can perform a wide variety of functions. From printing precious photographs, official documents, student essays therefore choosing the right printer is essential. Here are the things we feel one should consider before making the final purchase.
Color or Monochrome:
Monochrome (black) laser printers are much cheaper in cost than Color laser printers. Not in just unit cost but in toner costs as well because color lasers need both black and color toner cartridges.
Therefore what types of documents you print should determine whether you choose a color or monochrome printer. If you just print documents such as essays or pdf’s you probably don’t need to spend the money on a color laser printer. But if you print anything with color such as photographs then you should buy a color laser printer.
Connectivity:
Most printers come standard with USB connectivity. If you are planning to use the printer for office work Ethernet connectivity is a must. This will allow you to easily share the printer so multiple people can print to the same printer. If you want to either share your printer and don’t have Ethernet ports then wireless capability is a must. Keep in mind wireless is slower than Ethernet. Moral of the story is that the more connectivity options you have the more flexibility you have location wise.
Paper capabilities:
Most laser printers on the market can handle paper up to A4 size. Therefore if you want to print A3-sized paper, you will have to search and find a printer that is capable of this feature. Also you may want to check the size of the paper tray. If you print frequently or plan on office use you want to find a printer that holds a minimum of 250 sheets of paper. Another consideration is if the printer has a duplex ability. Printing duplex is the ability of a printer to print on both sides of the paper automatically.
MISC:
There are other factors to weigh such as
- the cost of replacement toner
- speed (how many pages per minute)
- yield of the toner (how many pages can be printed)
- the duty cycle (amount of pages printer can yield in a month without causing damage)
- size of laser printer
- ease of installation
Here are our picks for best budget wireless monochrome laser printer:
So you decided that since you only primarily print black and white documents a monochrome laser printer would be the best choice for you. Therefore review our picks for the best budget monochrome wireless printer and pick the one that most meets your needs.
Canon imageCLASS LBP6230dw
Basics
The Canon imageCLASS LBP6230dw is both small enough to share a space with, and capable enough to do the job in a very small office environment. This printer comes equipped with a 250-sheet input tray, a one-sheet manual feed, and a duplexer for automatic two-sided printing. Duty Cycle is for up to 5,000 pages per month. This should easily be enough for most personal or micro-office use. If you think you will need more look elsewhere because Canon doesn’t offer any upgrade options.
Speed and print quality
Canon rates the LBP6230dw at 26 ppm in simplex (one-sided mode) and 16 pages per minute (ppm) printing in duplex mode. The output quality from the printer isn’t impressive but is more than good enough for most personal or small business needs. Therefore unless you have an unusual need for small font sizes text quality is about the same as the vast majority of monochrome laser printers.
When printing graphics, photos, or anything other than text the output is typical for a monochrome laser printer also. Therefore quality should be good enough for Microsoft Office handouts such as PowerPoint. To give you an idea on quality, the photos should be similar to what you would see photos looking like in a newspaper.
Overall impression
The Canon imageCLASS LBP6230dw does deliver a balance of speed, paper handling, and output quality that is on par with most monochrome laser printers on the market. It is one of least expensive wireless laser printers on the market as well. Therefore if you need an inexpensive, fast monochrome laser printer for either personal or small business use give this printer a good hard look.
One potential issue we see for the printer though is a relatively high running cost. The running cost is a little higher than similar priced monochrome laser printers because of the cost of replacement toner cartridges.
PROS:
- Price for printer
- Fast printing with automatic duplex
- Small size
CONS:
- Price for Toner cartridge replacements
- Average print output
Check Price and Customer Reviews
Samsung Xpress M2825DW
Basics
The Samsung Xpress M2825DW offers an attractive package of features that is rare for personal monochrome laser printers. This printer comes equipped with a 250-sheet paper tray, plus a one-page manual feed slot, so you don’t have to swap out the paper in the tray every time you want to print a page or two on a different paper stock. Besides that it also comes with automatic duplexer and a a 12,000-page monthly duty cycle.
Speed and print quality
Samsung rates the M2825DW at 29 pages per minute (ppm). 250-sheet input tray, a one-sheet manual feed slot, and a duplexer (for automatic two-sided printing). The print quality is in the typical range for a monochrome laser printer across the board.
Unless you are a perfectionist the print quality should be good enough for Microsoft Office products. Photo quality is also typical for monochrome laser printers which translates to newspaper photo quality. Therefore in our opinion this wireless laser printer is suitable for personal use and small business use.
Overall impression
The Samsung Xpress M2825DW is low priced and has small form factor to fit most spaces. It also delivers reasonably fast print speeds with a decent quality output. Besides that it also offers an unusually capable paper handing ability. Therefore all these facts make this wireless printer a highly attractive printer for the price.
PROS:
- Price for printer
- Fast printing with automatic duplex
- Small size
CONS:
- No additional paper handling options available.
Check Price and Customer Reviews
Brother Compact HL-L2350DW
Basics
The Brother HL-L2350DW is very close in price, features, and capacity to the other two wireless laser printers we reviewed above. This printer also has a 250-sheet paper tray capacity with an automatic duplexer as well. Besides that has a 15,000 page monthly duty cycle.
Speed and print quality
Brother rates the HL-L2350DW at 32 pages per minute (ppm). Keeping in mind that this device isn’t designed to print out sleek, glossy documents and images it performs it’s intended use well. Reviews have stated that Microsoft Office documents printed well down to 6 or 7 points. Therefore we feel the print output is more than acceptable for all except the most exacting applications.
The photo output is not the best we have seen, although it’s respectable for this class of printer. Therefore like the two printers reviewed above it’s plenty good enough for personal use and small business application.
Overall impression
Let’s be honest that there is nothing thrilling about an entry-level monochrome wireless printer. But the Brother HL-L2350DW gets the job it was designed to do done and well. This device prints well enough, is fast enough, and inexpensive enough to hold its own among its competitors. As with most monochrome budget laser printers, if you want to decrease cost per page you will want to buy a much more expensive laser printer to lower your toner replacement costs. Therefore if you don’t have the need to print thousands of docs a month then the HL-L2350DW should meet your personal and small business needs nicely.
PROS:
- Price for printer
- Rated fastest among budget laser printers we reviewed
- Small size
- Print quality overall
CONS:
- Lacks Ethernet port.
- No support for external drives.
Check Price and Customer Reviews
Here are our picks for best budget wireless color laser printer:
So you decided that since you print a mixture of black and white and color documents a color laser printer would be the best choice for you. Therefore review our picks for the best budget color wireless printer and pick the one that most meets your needs.
Dell C1760nw Color Laser Printer
Basics
The Dell C1760nw has solid but unspectacular speed and print output quality. The print engine is LED based therefore uses light-emitting diodes rather than lasers as its light source. All LED printers are in laser printer class since they share so many of the same characteristics. LED printers are usually lighter than pure laser printers and the C1760nw is no different.
The C1760nw also has a paper capacity of 150 sheets. Besides that is also has a 10-sheet bypass tray so you can easily switch to alternate paper stock if you so choose. Some downsides are that it an lacks auto-duplexer for printing on both sides of a sheet of paper, as well as a port for a USB thumb drive.
Speed and print quality
Dell rates the C1760nw at 15 ppm in black and 12 ppm in color. While these speeds aren’t necessarily fast they are at least average to this class of laser printers. The print output while solid is probably a touch below par for a color laser printer. Printed text should be fine for personal and small business use but not if you require printing with very small fonts a lot.
As for photos and graphics colors were bold and well saturated while some black backgrounds appeared faded. Thin color lines are often hard to see while most illustrations show graininess and posterization. Therefore in our opinion print output should be ok for Microsoft Office documents but we would hesitate giving to people we want to impress.
Overall impression
The Dell C1760nw wireless laser printer is a small and capable LED-based printer that would do a solid job in a very small business or home office. It does have a decent print speed compared to equivalent color lasers and with a 10 sheet bypass tray. This device does have a smaller 150 sheet tray though that could cause some issues if shared with others. Besides that is also lacks automatic duplexing and a usb port for thumb drives.
PROS:
- Price for printer
- USB, Wi-Fi, and Ethernet connectivity
- Small form factor
- Decently priced refill toner cartridges compared to competition
CONS:
- No automatic duplexer
- No USB port for thumb drives
Check Price and Customer Reviews
Samsung Xpress C430W Wireless Color Laser Printer
Basics:
The Samsung Xpress C430W is your standard budget color laser printer that’s solid but is not spectacular at any one thing. The speed of this printer is a little slow but the print output is surprisingly good. This is one of the first color laser printers to support NFC (near-field-communication) according to Samsung. With NFC one can send a print job from a compatible device simply by tapping that device against the printer.
The C430W also has a paper capacity of 150 sheets. Besides that is also has a 50-sheet bypass tray at the top of the device so you can easily switch to alternate paper stock if you so choose. Some downsides are lack of auto-duplexer for printing on both sides of a sheet of paper, as well as a port for a USB thumb drive.
Speed and print quality
Samsung rates the Xpress C430W at 19 pages per minute black and at 4 pages per minute color. Many customers claim you probably get speeds of half that in reality. So in other words this color laser printer is no speed demon when printing. Where this printer makes up for speed is print quality which is surprisingly good for a low-end model. The only downside to overall printing is the high cost of replacement toner cartridges.
As for photos and graphics, color accuracy was excellent. The print output of colors printed smoothly and looked fairly realistic, whether they were flesh tones, landscapes, or objects. The overall quality for printing a document containing graphics and/or images was more than acceptable.
Overall impression
The Samsung Xpress C430W is your typical color laser printer. Where it excels at is the print quality of pictures and graphics compared to other similar color lasers. It also has NFC capabilities which could be meaningful to some customers. We do suggest this printer for small business or home office but not to student due to toner replacement costs. If you buy official toner replacements the cost of all 4 cartridges could be close to the cost of the printer itself. You can always buy 3rd party cartridges and save money but quality could be an issue.
PROS:
- NFC printing
- Wi-fi, Ethernet, usb connectivity
- Very good print quality output
CONS:
- Slow print performance
- Color toner costs are a little high
- No automatic duplexer
- No USB port for thumb drives
Check Price and Customer Reviews
HP Laserjet Pro M254dw color laser printer
Basics
Our last review is the HP Laserjet Pro M254dw. Although it’s a bit more expensive than the Dell and Samsung color laser printers we reviewed above you don’t have to sacrifice speed or print quality. Therefore by paying a little more you the best features of both previously reviewed color laser printers.
The M254dw also has a paper capacity of 150 sheets. But where it differs from the other models is that it offers automatic duplexing and has a usb port for printing from a thumb drive. Also offers NFC technology like the Samsung Xpress C430W.
Speed and print quality
HP rates the Laserjet Pro M254dw at 19 pages per minute for both color and black and white. While this might not seem impressive at first when doing actual printing this printer out performed every color laser printer near its price point. Overall print output is above par for a color laser.
As for photos and graphics, text is a match for most laser prints while colors are eye catching and well saturated. Besides that colors could be a tad dark in photos and more so in graphics. Therefore graphic and photo quality is easily good enough for almost any business use.
Overall Impression
The HP Laserjet Pro M254dw key strength is that it beats most of its competitors in both speed and print output quality. That’s a notable feat around this price point because most color lasers in this price range tend to score well in only one of those categories. Besides that it offers NFC connectivity, Auto duplexing, and versatile connection options. If you are willing to spend the extra money we strongly recommend this budget color wireless printer for personal and business use.
PROS:
- NFC printing
- Wi-fi, Ethernet, usb connectivity
- Fast printer speeds
- Very good print quality output
- Auto duplexer
- USB drive for thumb drives
CONS:
- A little more costlier than other models
- Somewhat expensive color toner cartridges
Check Price and Customer Reviews
Conclusion:
The choice between a budget monochrome or color laser printer is not easy. Monochrome laser printers are usually faster and cheaper to use. Color laser printers aren’t usually good enough to print photographs so therefore the question is do you print enough color documents to justify buying a color laser printer. If you primary print photographs you might consider a inkjet printer because they can usually print better quality photos.
Wireless laser printers while convenient can have connectivity and speed issues. Although wireless is easier to setup, an ethernet connection is faster and more reliable. Not everyone has an ethernet port to plug into though and installing one could be a big added expense. Therefore one must decide which they prefer more ease of use and setup or reliability and consistent speed.
We hope this guide helps you in deciding what the best budget wireless laser print is for you. Please leave us comments or questions below.