7 Best Ways to Cut Printer Running Costs

If your printer feels like a coin slot that never fills up, you are not imagining it. Ink and toner are among the priciest liquids and powders you will ever buy by the ounce, and small habits add up fast. I have run home and small-office printers for years and tracked my own supply spending closely, so I know exactly where the money leaks out. The good news is that most of it is fixable without buying a new machine. By the end of this guide you will have seven practical, proven ways to cut printing costs, from settings you change once to habits that pay off every single day.

Why Printing Costs So Much More Than You Think

The printer itself is rarely the expensive part. Manufacturers often sell the hardware cheaply because the real money is in the ink and toner you buy for years afterward. That is why a budget printer can end up costing far more than a pricier one over its life.

The number that actually matters is your cost per page, not the price on the cartridge box. A cheap cartridge that prints few pages can cost more per page than a pricier one that lasts. Once you start thinking in cost per page, every tip below makes sense. If you want the full background, our complete guide to printer ink and toner lays out the fundamentals.

1. Print Less by Default

The cheapest page is the one you never print. This sounds obvious, but most of us print things we never actually needed on paper: confirmation emails, web pages with ads, or five copies when one would do.

Get in the habit of using print preview every time. It shows you stray blank pages, oversized headers, and that one trailing line that spills onto a whole extra sheet. Trimming those before you print saves both paper and ink on every job.

When you only need the words, save the file as a PDF instead of printing it. You keep a clean copy, you can search it later, and you spend nothing. I moved my receipts and manuals to a simple folder on my computer and cut my monthly page count by nearly a third.

2. Use Draft Mode and Grayscale

Your printer almost certainly defaults to a higher quality setting than everyday documents need. For emails, drafts, directions, and anything that is not going to a client, draft mode (sometimes called economy or fast) uses noticeably less ink and prints quicker too.

Grayscale is the other easy win. Color ink is expensive, and printing a black-and-white document in color mode can still sip from the color tanks. Setting black-only for text documents keeps those pricey color cartridges full for when you truly need them.

You can set both as your defaults so you do not have to remember each time. Look in your printer preferences under Print Quality and Color, then set draft and grayscale as the standard, switching to high quality only for photos.

3. Buy High-Yield Cartridges

High-yield cartridges (often labeled XL or high-capacity) hold more ink or toner and cost less per page than standard sizes, even though the sticker price looks scarier at checkout. For anyone who prints more than a handful of pages a week, they almost always save money.

The trick is to compare cost per page, not box price. Divide the cartridge price by its rated page yield, and you will usually find the bigger cartridge wins by a comfortable margin. Our roundup of 9 high-yield cartridges worth buying shows how the math plays out across common models.

If you own a laser printer, the same logic applies to toner. Not sure which technology you have or which is cheaper to run for your needs? Our explainer on ink versus toner and the difference between them helps you match the supply to how you actually print.

Choice	Sticker Price	Pages (approx.)	Cost Per Page
Standard cartridge	Lower	200	Higher
High-yield (XL) cartridge	Higher	500+	Lower
Draft mode on standard	Same	Stretches further	Lower still

4. Choose the Right Cartridge, Not Just the Cheapest

Third-party and remanufactured cartridges can cut costs meaningfully, and many are perfectly reliable. Others cause faded prints, leaks, or recognition errors that waste more ink than they save. The savings only count if the print quality and cartridge life hold up.

Read reviews, buy from sellers with a clear return policy, and test one before you stock up. Our side-by-side look at genuine versus third-party cartridges weighs the real tradeoffs so you can decide with your eyes open.

Refilling is another route worth considering, though results vary by model and kit quality. We break down when it pays and when it backfires in our comparison of refill versus buy new and which saves more. Before any big supply purchase, our ink and toner buying checklist keeps you from overpaying.

5. Stop Wasting the Ink You Already Paid For

A surprising amount of ink is lost not to printing but to habits. Powering an inkjet off at the wall can trigger cleaning cycles when it wakes, and each cycle uses ink. Use the printer’s own power button so it can cap the nozzles properly.

Running cleaning cycles over and over is another quiet drain. One cycle is usually enough; repeating it back to back just flushes ink onto a pad. If prints stay poor, the fix is often storage or a clog, not more cleaning.

Store spare cartridges upright, sealed, and away from heat so they do not dry out before you use them, as our guide on how to store cartridges so they do not dry out explains. For a fuller list of avoidable slips, see our roundup of 8 mistakes that waste ink and toner.

6. Print on Both Sides and Fit More on the Page

Paper is cheaper than ink, but it still adds up, and cutting it also cuts clutter. If your printer supports duplex (two-sided) printing, turn it on for documents. If it does not, you can print odd pages, flip the stack, and print the even pages manually.

For reference material or handouts, printing two pages per sheet halves your paper use again. Reusing the blank back of misprints as scratch paper is an old trick that still works, especially in a busy home office.

Quick Steps to Set Up Two-Sided Printing

1. Open the print dialog from any document and click Properties or Preferences. Expected result: your printer’s settings window appears.
2. Find the Finishing or Layout tab. Expected result: you see options for orientation and sides.
3. Select Print on Both Sides (choose flip on long edge for most documents). Expected result: the duplex option is checked.
4. Set it as the default if the option is offered, so you do not repeat this each time. Expected result: two-sided becomes your standard.
5. Print a test document to confirm the pages land in the right order. Expected result: a clean, correctly ordered two-sided page.

7. Track Your Costs and Match the Printer to the Job

You cannot cut what you do not measure. For one month, jot down what you print and how often you replace supplies. When I tracked my own ink for a stretch, I was surprised to find a single recurring color job was eating most of my budget, and moving it to a print shop was far cheaper.

That kind of insight only shows up when you look. Our story on tracking real ink costs for a year shows how eye-opening the numbers can be, and how much they can be reduced.

Finally, match the tool to the task. Occasional color photos may be cheaper at a kiosk than at home. Heavy text printing suits a laser printer, which costs less per page over time. Being honest about your real needs is the biggest saving of all. You can read how we test and recommend supplies on our editorial policy page.

For a neutral overview of how printers are priced and why supplies drive the cost, the Wikipedia article on computer printers is a helpful, ad-free read.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does draft mode really save that much ink?

Yes, more than most people expect. Draft mode lays down less ink per page, so on text-heavy documents it can stretch a cartridge considerably further. The print looks slightly lighter but stays perfectly readable, which makes it ideal for everyday notes, drafts, and internal paperwork you do not need to look polished.

Are high-yield cartridges worth it for light users?

Often yes, if the cartridge does not dry out first. High-yield cartridges lower your cost per page, but very light users risk the ink drying before it is used up. If you print only a few pages a month, buy standard sizes and store spares carefully so nothing goes to waste.

Will third-party ink void my printer or ruin it?

Reputable third-party ink rarely harms a printer, though quality varies between sellers. The main risks are inconsistent color, occasional leaks, or recognition messages. Buy from a well-reviewed source with a return policy, test one cartridge before stocking up, and keep a genuine spare on hand for important prints.

Should I leave my inkjet printer on all the time?

Leaving it on standby, or turning it off with its own power button, is usually better than cutting power at the wall. The printer parks and caps the print head to keep nozzles from drying. Frequent hard power cuts can trigger ink-hungry cleaning cycles every time the printer wakes.

What is the single biggest way to cut printing costs?

Printing less. Every page you avoid saves ink, toner, and paper at once, and it costs nothing to do. Use print preview, save documents as PDFs, and default to draft and grayscale. Combine that with high-yield supplies and light maintenance, and your yearly spending drops without any sacrifice in quality.

Small Changes, Real Savings

Cutting printing costs is not about one dramatic move; it is a handful of small, easy habits that quietly add up. Print less, lean on draft and grayscale, buy smart, protect the ink you have, and match the machine to the task. Pick even two or three of these and you will feel the difference within a month. When you are ready to keep saving, our complete guide to printer ink and toner is here whenever you want it, with plenty more friendly, practical advice and no pressure at all.