Best Photo Printers for High-Quality Prints: Top 10 Compared for 2023

The best photo printers today are reliable and high-quality, but with numerous options available, it can be hard to find the right one for you. That’s why we’ve taken a snapshot of all the picture printing options currently on the market in 2023, and we’ve put together our pick of the top 10 photo printers today.

There’s something for every type of photographer in this list of the best photo printers, from the most expensive professional photo prints right down to the best portable mini printers. Read on and find out about the best printers for photos from Canon, Epson, HP, and more.

The 10 Best Photo Printers on the Market

To help you find the ideal photo printer for your requirements, we’ve compiled a list of the 10 best photo printers available on the market today.

1. Canon PIXMA Pro-200 — Experience exceptional print quality and versatility. Enjoy professional-grade prints with outstanding clarity. Our pick for the best home printer.
2. Epson ET-8500 — High-quality prints and low ink costs. This all-in-one supertank printer delivers exceptional print quality while keeping long-term expenses low.
3. HP Envy Inspire 7955e — Seamless home office printing with advanced features, including wireless printing and high-quality borderless photos. A great printer with six months of free ink.
4. Canon Pro-300 — Offers pro-level print quality, versatile paper compatibility, and easy operation in a compact design. With its cost-effective ink system, it ensures high-quality prints while minimizing ink expenses.
5. Kodak Step Mini — Print memories on the go with this portable printer that uses Zink Zero Ink technology for hassle-free printing. Allows you to print high-quality, customizable photos in 60 seconds.
6. HP Sprocket — An affordable portable printer for on-demand photos whenever you need them. Slim, rechargeable build that fits in your pocket.
7. Canon Pixma TR150 — This portable printer’s compact design, wireless connectivity, and vibrant prints make it the ultimate portable printing solution for field work and mobile offices.
8. Fujifilm Instax Mini 2 — Unlock your artistic potential and cherish memories while on vacation with this small, user-friendly smartphone printer. Seamlessly connects to your smartphone via Bluetooth, allowing you to add frames, filters, sketches, and stickers.
9. Liene DHP513 — Portable photo printer with exceptional quality, user-friendly design, and creative options through the Liene app.
10. Canon Pixma G620 — This scanner-printer combo delivers high-quality photo prints with its six-color dye-based ink system. It’s a budget-friendly printer that’s perfect for capturing your memories in stunning detail.

How Does a Photo Printer Work?

A photo printer uses a combination of technologies to produce printed copies of digital images.

First, the photo printer receives a digital image file. This may come from a connected computer, although some printers can also read from a phone, camera, or memory card. The printer’s software then processes and loads the image in a form appropriate for the printing method.

Most consumer photo printers utilize inkjet technology. The printer contains ink cartridges with different color inks – typically cyan, magenta, yellow, and black. These inks are precisely sprayed by the printer’s printhead, which moves back and forth across the paper, depositing the inks in small droplets to print a recreation of the digital image.

For prints that require multiple pages, the printer feeds the appropriately sized paper from a tray and advances it as the printhead applies the ink.

After printing, the ink on the paper needs time to dry. Some printers use specially formulated inks that dry quickly, while others may require a short waiting period before handling the prints. Once the ink is dry, the printed photos can be displayed, handled, or further processed as desired.

Most printers require regular maintenance, which includes cleaning the printhead and eliminating paper jams in the feeding mechanisms. The cartridges that provide ink will eventually run out, requiring users to refill them with ink or buy new ink cartridges.

Factors to Consider When Buying a Printer for Photos

When purchasing a printer specifically for printing photos, there are several important factors to consider. Here are some key considerations:

Print Quality

Depending on your budget, you’ll need to consider the printer’s resolution, color accuracy, and the number of ink cartridges it uses to get the best value out of your photo printer. Higher resolutions and greater ink consumption generally result in better print quality but make the printer more expensive to operate.

Printing Technology

Inkjet printers are commonly used for photo printing due to their ability to produce vibrant colors and sharp details. However, there are also other printing technologies available, such as dye-sublimation printers, which allow you to transfer printed images onto fabric via heat transfer, and laser printers, which fuse toner onto the paper, instead of ink.

Print Size and Media Handling

One of the primary factors for your choice will be the maximum print size you require. Some printers support standard photo sizes like 4 x 6 inches or 5 x 7 inches, while others can handle larger formats like 8 x 10 inches or even 13 x 19 inches.

Not all paper is created equal, either, so make sure you’ve got a printer that can handle the heaviness of your print medium, including gloss finishes. And of course, the larger the printer is, the more space it’ll take up – which is a worthwhile consideration if it’s taking up room on your gaming desk.

Connectivity Options

USB and WiFi are common connectivity options, allowing you to print directly from your computer or wirelessly from your mobile devices. Some printers also support printing from memory cards or USB drives. Other printers come with Ethernet connectivity, which allows access over a network from multiple computers.

Printer Speed

You’ll also need to consider the printing speed if you anticipate frequently printing a large number of photos – for example, from an office printer. Print speed is measured in Pages Per Minute (PPM), which means a PPM of 12 – which is near the high end of color printer speed but the low end of laser printer speed – would print you a page every 5 seconds.

Cost of Consumables

Some printers are affordable but require expensive ink replacements, which can add up over time. Printers often come with proprietary ink or toner cartridges, which are more expensive than the alternatives. If you’re trying to save money on a long-term printer, look for printers with reasonably priced ink cartridges or options for third-party alternatives.

The Best Picture Printing Products Reviewed

Now that you know what to look out for when choosing the best professional photo printers, check out our top ten list below for our top picks.

1. Canon PIXMA Pro-200 — Our #1 Pick for Best Photo Inkjet Printers

The Canon PIXMA PRO-200 is our top recommendation for high-quality print capability. It’s a professional-grade wireless color photo printer designed for photographers and graphic artists that can print highly detailed photos in anything up to A3 size.

The printer achieves this with its enhanced eight-color dye-based ink system, which delivers rich and vibrant prints far beyond what a normal inkjet can achieve. The printer is compatible with a wide range of media and sizes, allowing for borderless printing or custom sizes up to 13″ x 39″ at a stunning 2400DPI.

It’s all the more impressive that the PRO-200 offers such high printing fidelity in a relatively small package, making it suitable for home or studio use, where space may be at a minimum. It’s reasonably fast too, and is able to output a single page of color A4 every minute and A3 pages every 75 seconds.

Even if you’re feeding in large A3 projects, Canon’s anti-skew technology means the printer’s inbuilt stabilizers will keep the image output straight on the paper.

The PRO-200 is also easy to operate, thanks to a built-in 3-inch LCD display, which allows you to easily adjust the printer’s settings without a computer. Canon’s Professional Print & Layout software for Windows is also included with the printer, which allows you to control the printer’s output by adjusting spacing, crop marks, and color adjustments, as well as to make pre-print checks.

It seamlessly integrates into existing photo workflows with programs such as Adobe Photoshop.

Pricing

At $599, the Canon PIXMA PRO-200 is one of the more expensive printers you’ll find on our list. It’s at the top because it offers an excellent balance between price and performance. This printer provides exceptional value for those seeking professional-grade prints thanks to an extremely high DPI and a versatile set of editing features in Canon’s PPL.

It’s a worthwhile investment for photographers, artists, and print enthusiasts who work on large, high-detail prints.

2. Epson ET-8500 — Economical Photography Printing

The Epson EcoTank Photo ET-8500 is a top choice for consumers looking for a high-quality wireless photo printer with low running costs. It offers great print quality, especially for photos, and has significantly lower running costs than most photo printers, thanks to a focus on ink efficiency.

The printer’s compact size makes it suitable for home offices or families. It has a small footprint and weighs 18.5 pounds, making it pretty light when compared to other printers in its class.

The ET-8500 performs well with an average printing speed of 16 PPM for monochrome text documents and 12 PPM for color business documents. It prints glossy 4-by-6-inch snapshots at an average of 58 seconds per image, which is relatively fast for a consumer-grade photo printer using glossy paper.

The ET-8500 features a flatbed scanner for short copy or scan jobs, but it doesn’t support larger, multipage stacks because it lacks an automatic document feeder. This limits its scanning and copying capabilities to one page at a time, which may not be ideal for users who frequently handle multipage documents.

The ET-8500 excels with excellent connectivity options, including Ethernet, USB, and WiFi, as well as support for printing from SD cards and USB drives. Not only does it have great connectivity, but it integrates with software solutions like Epson Scan 2, Epson ScanSmart, and Epson Photo+, as well as Twain and ISIS scanner drivers for connecting to third-party applications.

Pricing

If you’re willing to make the initial investment of $759.99, the Epson EcoTank Photo ET-8500 is a great choice for those who prioritize high-quality prints with low long-term costs. The ET-8500 offers cost-efficient printing, with an estimated cost per print of $0.003 for monochrome pages and $0.009 for color pages.

Even high-quality borderless 4 x 6-inch photo prints only cost $0.04 per image, which is significantly cheaper than traditional cartridge-based photo printers.

3. HP Envy Inspire 7955e — Scan and Print High Quality Photos

The HP Envy Inspire 7955e is one of the best all-in-one photo printers we’ve seen yet. The built-in scanner allows you to scan high-quality images at up to 1200 DPI, which is perfect for copying existing images to print pictures.

Each purchase comes with six months of free ink when you sign up for the HP+ program. This includes a subscription to the Instant Ink delivery service, ensuring you never run out of ink as it automatically ships to your doorstep. With HP+, you also gain access to automatic updates and free smart features, enhancing mobile printing and security.

It’s a perfect choice for active families, allowing you to print documents and high-quality borderless photos of various sizes and engage in creative projects.

The HP Envy Inspire 7955e boasts key features for high-volume photograph printing, such as automatic two-sided printing, a separate photo tray, auto-document feeder, and one-click wireless connectivity. This makes it a great choice for scanning multiple documents in one go, especially if you have to copy them too.

The attractive design and small form factor ensure it’ll fit into any home setup or office, with excellent WiFi range ensuring you won’t get caught out by connectivity dead zones. It’s convenient, too, thanks to the HP Smart app that allows you to connect from mobile devices directly without needing a computer.

Pricing

The HP Envy Inspire 7955e is one of the most cost-effective choices for a full inkjet printer we’ve found. At $169.99, it offers a competitive package with its impressive auto-scanning features. Not only does it come with six months of free ink when you activate HP+, but it also offers significant savings of up to 50% on ink costs.

4. Canon Pro-300 — Automatic Self-Repairing Photo Printer

The Canon PRO-300 is an inkjet photo and fine art printer that’s ideal for ultra-high-quality photos. The printer’s 9-color plus Chroma Optimizer ink system is designed to deliver the highest quality prints with rich colors and fine details, especially on coated papers. It’s built to meet the demands of both advanced amateurs and professional photographers.

The PRO-300 impressed us with its wide array of productivity-enhancing capabilities. When an ink nozzle clogs, it can often ruin the run of a current set of prints. However, Canon’s Nozzle Recovery System ensures uninterrupted printing by automatically detecting and compensating for clogged nozzles during the printing process, saving you time and money.

The PRO-300 prints the highest quality photographs at 2400 DPI over an A3 canvas, satisfying the requirements of anyone who needs to print large photos. You’ll need to keep buying Canon printer ink, which can be a little more expensive, but it’s worth it to take full advantage of the color accuracy afforded by LUCIA PRO ink. It’s a little slower than our top pick, but the PRO-300’s quality is second to none.

Your larger prints will retain crisp, clean lines as the PRO-300 uses a Skew Correction feature that helps to align the paper correctly for precise and accurate prints across the page every single time.

Any compatible Canon camera can connect to the PRO-300 and print the photos from their storage without additional hassle. Uploading the RAW files directly in this way allows for printing out the highest-quality HDR prints as you take them on location with one click using the Wireless PictBridge protocol.

Pricing

The Canon PRO-300 is the most expensive printer we’ve picked for our list at $849, but it’s justified by its professional-grade capabilities and the exceptional print quality it delivers. While the printer might be overkill for the average user, it’s a great choice for photographers and artists who require top-notch print output and a range of impressive features to support their creative process.

If you’re looking for something a little cheaper, you can check out our list of the best home printers for affordable alternatives.

5. Kodak Step Mini — Highly Portable Mini Photo Printer

The KODAK Step Mini is a portable, lightweight smartphone photo printer that offers convenience without skimping on quality. Weighing less than a pound, the Step Mini is designed to be compact and travel-friendly. The built-in lithium-ion rechargeable battery ensures you can print up to 25 photos on a single charge, making it perfect for on-the-go use.

It connects seamlessly to any iOS or Android device via Bluetooth or NFC, allowing for instant photo printing. This means you can easily print your favorite pictures directly from your smartphone or tablet without the need for additional cables or complicated setup processes.

Whether you’re on vacation, at a party, or simply want to share memories with your loved ones, the KODAK Step Mini makes it easy to turn your digital images into tangible prints with a small card printer.

What makes this mini photo printer truly portable is its use of Zink Zero Ink technology. This innovative printing technology eliminates the need for expensive ink cartridges, toners, or ribbons. Instead, the printer uses special 2″ x 3″ Zink paper that contains embedded dye crystals.

When the printer applies heat to the paper, the crystals activate and produce high-quality, colorful prints. This not only saves you money on consumables but also ensures that your prints are durable, resistant to moisture, smudges, tears, and fading.

To enhance your photo printing experience, the KODAK app provides a full editing suite. With this app, you can easily customize your pictures by adding filters, borders, stickers, and text.

The editing options go beyond basic adjustments, allowing you to unleash your creativity and add a personal touch to your prints. You can even create collages or edit photos from your camera roll directly within the app, making it a comprehensive tool for photo customization.

Pricing

The KODAK Step Mini offers a convenient and portable solution for on-the-go photo printing. With its affordable price of $69.99, it provides excellent value for money. The printer utilizes Zink Zero Ink technology, eliminating the need for expensive ink cartridges. However, it’s worth noting that the cost of photo paper can add up, particularly when purchasing smaller packs.

6. HP Sprocket — Cheap Photo Prints On The Go

The HP Sprocket printer is a portable photo printer that allows you to print 2″ x 3″ photographs directly from your smartphone or social media account. It uses Zink Zero Ink technology, eliminating the need for expensive toner or ribbon replacements. The glossy sticky-back photo paper is resistant to water, smudges, and tears.

The Sprocket comes with a free HP app that offers you unique filters, frames, and editing tools, allowing you to customize your snaps with stickers, borders, and emojis on your phone. It can be connected to multiple devices, making it convenient for instant printing at parties or events.

The slim and portable design of the printer makes it easy to carry in your backpack or pocket, and it is rechargeable via any micro USB charging cable.

You’ll be ready to print from the moment your Sprocket arrives, as the package includes HP Zink photo paper with peel-and-stick backing for instant photos or stickers. With Bluetooth 5.0 and sleep mode, the printer stays connected and ready to print without draining your battery.

We found that the print quality is satisfactory, but we often needed to adjust the brightness of our pictures in the app to get the best results. The ability to print on sticker-backed paper is a nice feature that some other portable printers don’t include, allowing you to easily decorate journals and other items.

The printer’s small size and fast print speed make it great for small print needs during events and gatherings, such as creating guest books and adding photos to name tags.

Pricing

The HP Sprocket 2nd Edition printer is an affordable option for on-demand photo printing. Priced at $79, this portable printer allows you to print 2″ x 3″ photographs without the need for toner or ribbon replacements.

With its Zink Zero Ink technology and glossy sticky-back photo paper, you can enjoy smudge-proof prints no matter where you are, but you should keep in mind you’ll be spending around $0.80 a sheet.

7. Canon Pixma TR150 — Durable Design For Travelling

The Canon Pixma TR150 Wireless Mobile Printer is a portable printer designed for professionals who need to print on the go. With its compact and lightweight design, it offers outstanding portability, making it easy to carry in bags and backpacks. Despite its small size, this printer delivers exceptional print quality, allowing you to print sharp documents and vibrant photos up to 8.5″ x 11″.

Whether you’re in the office, at home, or traveling, the Pixma TR150 ensures that you can easily print anytime, anywhere.

The TR150 integrates with a wide range of wireless printing options, including the Canon Print App, Apple AirPrint, Mopria Print Service, and Google Cloud Print. This means you can print directly from your mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets, without the need for additional cables or connections.

The intuitive interface with a 1.44-inch OLED display further enhances the user experience, allowing for easy navigation and print job management directly from the printer.

The Pixma TR150 has an optional battery pack that enables printing even when you’re on the move, making it one of the best portable photo printers we’ve seen. This is especially useful for professionals who frequently travel or work in locations without access to an AC outlet.

While we found the setup and WiFi linking process was a little more challenging than it should have been, once connected, the printer performs admirably on the road. It’s durable and is especially suited for traveling in rough environments. The wireless connectivity of the Pixma TR150 is fast and reliable once properly connected, making it a convenient and efficient choice for quick wireless printing needs.

Pricing

The Canon Pixma TR150 Wireless Mobile Printer is priced at $249, making it a mid-range option. While it may not be the most affordable printer on the market, it offers excellent value for its portable and wireless features. Considering its durability and convenience, the Pixma TR150’s pricing is reasonable, especially for professionals who require a reliable and high-quality printer for their mobile printing needs.

8. Fujifilm Instax Mini 2 — Customizable and Cheap Photo Prints

The Fujifilm Instax Mini 2 is a cheap and convenient way to print your favorite photos via this compact, lightweight smartphone printer. The printer is designed for use with INSTAX MINI instant film, which produces small 2″ x 3″ photos with a charming vintage appeal. It connects wirelessly to your smartphone via Bluetooth, allowing you to easily transfer and print images.

With the INSTAX MINI LINK App, you can customize your images by adding frames, filters, sketches, and stickers before printing. There’s even an INSTAXAiR feature that enables you to draw doodles or shapes on your photos, and a QR code can be printed alongside the image to capture your drawing process.

We believe it’s one of the best instant photo printers for cheap photo prints, mainly thanks to the INSTAX MINI Link app. It offers the ability to print photos from videos, which is a unique and fun feature.

You can select a special moment from your favorite videos and transform it into an INSTAX MINI image, then add a variety of extra cosmetic features with a few motion gestures using the Instax itself before printing it in one quick process.

In addition to its creative capabilities, the Fujifilm Instax Mini 2 comes with a MINI LINK 2 Printer, USB cable, and a one-year limited product warranty. This ensures you have everything you need to start printing and enjoying your memories immediately. It’s best paired with a good camera phone, so you can check out our list of the top ten best camera phones to get the perfect companion to your MINI LINK 2.

Pricing

The Fujifilm Instax Mini 2 is one of our more budget options at only $99.95. Bear in mind it prints only 2″ x 3″ photos and may not deliver professional-quality prints. It also requires a separate purchase of INSTAX MINI instant film, which can be a little expensive, but it does come with a one-year limited product warranty too.

9. Liene DHP513 — Specializes in Photo Prints Only

The Liene DHP513 is a 4″ x 6″ photo printer that offers wonderful photo quality compared to traditional photography printers. It uses thermal dye-sublimation technology, allowing the dyes to deeply penetrate the paper and create vibrant photos.

Printing in this way uses a protective layer that covers the photo, making it resistant to water, scratches, and fading. Wireless connectivity allows you to instantly print photos from your iPhone and preserve your precious memories with ease.

The user-friendly design of the Liene DHP513 ensures a hassle-free printing experience. It boasts a paper alignment feature that prevents paper jams, ensuring smooth printing every time. The accompanying Liene App provides step-by-step guidance to troubleshoot any printing issues.

When you buy the DHP513, it comes with 20 sheets of Liene photo printer paper and one cartridge, providing convenience right out of the box.

The Liene DHP513 acts as a built-in WiFi hotspot, too, allowing you to connect directly to the printer without relying on home networks. This advanced design offers a more reliable connection compared to Bluetooth or port connections. Additionally, the printer is compatible with both iPhones and Android devices, supporting up to five devices that can connect simultaneously.

With the Liene App, you can add various elements to your photos before printing. The app offers frames, filters, and effects to enhance your photos and unleash your creativity. It also provides real-time information on ink cartridge and paper levels, ensuring you’re always prepared for printing.

Pricing

The pricing for the Prynt Pocket is reasonable at $136.99 for what is the best photo printing service on a single use-case printer we’ve seen yet. The Prynt Pocket offers good value for those looking to print high-quality photos on the go, and the glossy finish really makes pictures feel like they’ve just come out of a print room.

10. Canon Pixma G620 — Affordable High Quality Printing

The Canon PIXMA G620 MegaTank Photo Printer is an affordable solution for high-quality photo printing. With the ability to print up to 3,800 4″ x 6″ color photos on just one set of ink bottles, it’s amongst the best dedicated photo printers and provides excellent value for money.

The six-color dye-based ink system, including Red and Gray inks, produces vibrant and accurate colors. It is designed for high-volume printing and is suitable for memory keepers, photo albums, and scrapbooks. The setup process is quick and easy, and you can print either through a high-speed USB connection or wirelessly from a computer or mobile device.

It may not sit at the top end of photo printing, but it excels in day-to-day document printing and produces good-quality photo prints. When you consider the lightweight and compact design – which makes it convenient for small spaces – it easily becomes a strong addition to a home office.

It also offers features like rear paper feeding, media versatility, easy ink bottle filling, and compatibility with mobile devices.

The Canon PIXMA G620 uses bottled ink instead of cartridges which makes it more affordable, improves document printing performance, and reduces maintenance. Unfortunately, that also comes with a relatively slow speed for inkjet photo printing, taking around 20 seconds for a 4″ x 6″ photo.

As the printer wears out over time, you may also observe roller marks on your prints or the black color output becoming more faint.

Pricing

The Canon PIXMA G620 is a mid-tier option at $299, offering a low cost per print and high page yield thanks to the ink bottle system. The printer’s ChromaLife 100 technique ensures long-lasting photo quality for up to 100 years in album storage, which makes it a great choice if you want to save on paper costs.

The Market’s Top-Rated Photo Printers Compared

Each of the printers we’ve looked at provides some great features for different use cases. Here’s a compact comparison table of our top ten so you can see how they line up against each other:

Conclusion – What’s the Best Photo Printer to Buy in 2023?

After careful consideration of key factors such as print quality, features, and value for money, we’ve concluded that the Canon PIXMA Pro-200 is the top choice for the best photo printer to buy in 2023. This printer delivers exceptional results in terms of color accuracy, sharpness, and detail, ensuring your printed photos look stunning and true to life.

It supports a wide range of paper sizes and types, providing versatility for various printing projects, including high-detail A3 prints. With its user-friendly interface and advanced connectivity options, including wireless printing and mobile device compatibility, the Canon PIXMA Pro-200 offers convenience and flexibility for both amateur and professional photographers.

Whether you’re capturing memories or creating art, this printer is sure to meet your needs and exceed your expectations.

Photo Printer FAQs