Cheapest Printer to Run UK 2026 — Real Cost-per-Page Compared
The cheapest printer to buy is almost never the cheapest printer to run. The big costs are ink or toner (recurring) and lock-in (printers that refuse third-party supplies, or subscriptions that punish you for under-using them).
This guide ranks current UK printers by real pence-per-page across three workloads — low (300 pages/year), medium (200 pages/month) and heavy (1500 pages/month). Mono and colour separated because the maths is completely different.
At a glance — the shortlist
| # | Model | Best for | Speed | Price band | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Brother HL-L2400DW | Cheapest brand-name mono — ~1-2p per page | 30 ppm | £99.59 | Amazon |
| 2 | Pantum P3300DW | Cheapest mono outright — ~1p per page with caveats | 33 ppm | £130-£170 | Amazon |
| 3 | Epson EcoTank ET-2850 | Cheapest colour to run — ~0.5p per page | 10.5 ppm | £240-£300 | Amazon |
| 4 | Epson EcoTank ET-2950 | Current-gen EcoTank — same maths | 10 ppm | £254.99 | Amazon |
| 5 | Canon i-SENSYS LBP243dw II | Honest Canon answer for mono | 36 ppm | £220.39 | Amazon |
| 6 | HP LaserJet M110we (HP+) | Cheapest on paper, expensive in reality | 20 ppm | £140.61 | Amazon |
| 7 | HP OfficeJet Pro 9120e | Mid-tier colour with subscription — only OK if your usage matches the tier | 22 ppm mono / 18 ppm colour | £144.97 | Amazon |
Brother · 30 ppm
Cheapest brand-name mono — ~1-2p per page
The Brother HL-L2400DW at £85 plus £15 third-party TN-2510 toner (3000 pages) works out at roughly 1-2p per black-and-white page including printer amortisation over 3000 pages. Toner has a 2-year+ shelf life (lasers don't dry out). Auto duplex halves your paper costs too.
Honest answer: this is the cheapest serious printer to run if you only ever print black text.
Pantum · 33 ppm
Cheapest mono outright — ~1p per page with caveats
Pantum P3300DW + £10 third-party TL-410 toner (1500 pages) lands at roughly 1p per page. Cheaper than Brother on consumables.
Caveats: Pantum support is patchy, the Windows driver is less polished than Brother, and the UK third-party toner market for Pantum is thinner. Worth it if you're price-sensitive and technically confident. Not worth it if you want plug-and-forget.
Epson · 10.5 ppm
Cheapest colour to run — ~0.5p per page
EcoTank is the cheapest way to print in colour, full stop. £240-300 up front, but the in-box ink lasts ~14,000 mono pages or ~5,200 colour pages — about 2-3 years of normal home use. Refill bottles £10-15. You're looking at well under 1p per page for both mono and colour at typical home volumes.
The catch: ink can dry in the tubes if you don't print at all for months. EcoTank wins for mixed colour/mono home use; loses to a mono laser if you only ever print black text.
Epson · 10 ppm
Current-gen EcoTank — same maths
Identical running-cost numbers to the ET-2850 (same ink system). Buy whichever is cheaper at the moment you're shopping.
Canon · 36 ppm
Honest Canon answer for mono
The Canon LBP243dw II at £190-240 runs at roughly 2-3p per page on third-party CRG-070H compatible toner (~£20 / 10,200 pages). More expensive printer up front than the Brother L2400DW, but a much higher-yield toner means lower per-page cost on heavier volumes.
HP · 20 ppm
Cheapest on paper, expensive in reality
£75 buys the M110we — but the price assumes you sign up to HP+ Instant Ink (£3.49/month for 100 pages). That's 3.5p per page minimum, plus rollover only goes so far. Unused pages don't refund. Unsubscribed M110we genuine toner is over £60 a cartridge.
Real-world running cost: typically 3-6p per page, often worse than a Brother. Don't buy this for low cost-per-page — buy a Brother L2400DW instead.
HP · 22 ppm mono / 18 ppm colour
Mid-tier colour with subscription — only OK if your usage matches the tier
The HP OfficeJet Pro 9120e + Instant Ink subscription is genuinely cheap if your monthly volume matches a tier. From around 2.5p per colour page on the right tier. But cartridges without Instant Ink are catastrophically expensive.
Honest take: if you can't predict your monthly print volume to within +/-50%, an EcoTank is cheaper because it doesn't punish underuse.
How we work out cost-per-page
Pence-per-page = (toner / ink cost) / (page yield at 5% coverage). Yields are manufacturer numbers, so real-world use can be 30% lower with heavy graphics. Printer amortisation (the up-front cost spread over the printer's reasonable life) typically adds 1-3p per page for low-volume users and disappears for heavy users.
The honest cheap-printing matrix
- Mono, any volume: Brother HL-L2400DW. Just buy it.
- Colour, low volume: EcoTank ET-2850 if you'll use it; phone camera if you won't.
- Colour, high volume: EcoTank ET-3850 or ET-4850, or a colour laser if you print mostly text.
- Avoid: any printer where the only cheap way to run it is a subscription you can cancel. Maths only works if you print exactly the right amount.