3 Best Black and White Printers in 2024 You Should Consider

Let’s be honest; black and white inkjets have become nearly extinct.

The good news is that you can still save money by choosing a monochrome {black and white} laser printer that is comparable to color models. Laser printers are cheaper to buy and perfect for those who mostly print black text on white pages.

Most people are more drawn to inkjet printers than monochrome laser printers. However, black and white laser printers tend to produce sharper and clearer text compared to ink-based printers.

People who print out more text will find mono laser printers better designed to produce a high-quality print at a fraction of the cost.

In this article, we look at the three best black and white printers in the current market and what you need to consider carefully before buying one.

What is a Monochrome Laser Printer?

When it comes to printing lots of black text, laser printers take the trophy.

A monochrome laser printer is will only give you the ability to print only monochrome documents such as invoices.

Laser printers are substantially faster than inkjets when it comes to printing professional business graphics. They can also handle more and heavier printing workload even for those who find themselves printing so many pages every single month.

Because black and white laser printers provide faster speeds, high text quality prints, and gives you economical prints per-page basis, you will most likely find them in busy offices.

They are also perfect for students and home office owners because it accommodates mass printing and can be purchased for the very low initial outlay.

In simple terms; black and white laser printers are printers that use black toner cartridges to print document s and photos in black and white.

What to Consider Before Buying a Black and White Printer

1.    Monthly Duty Cycle

All printers are specifically designed to carry a certain amount of workload. In order to reduce unexpected repairs and breakdowns, it is crucial to make sure that the laser printer will match your expected print volume with the manufacturer’s printer’s monthly capacity.

If on a regular basis, you go beyond the printer’s technical expectations, you will experience a frequent frustrating breakdown and an eventually shortened lifespan of the printer.

Hence, before buying the black and white printer of your choice, accurately determine how much you intend to print monthly.

Most manufacturers include the expected monthly duty cycle of the model to help customers choose the model that will suit their needs.

Hence, you can use this easy metric to easily pair your tailored needs with the workload the printer is designed to handle. This will also keep you from buying a printer that offers more power than you actually need.

2.    Cost Per Page

When shopping for an efficient black and white printer, this is a fundamental criterion to consider.  Why is this so? Because this is how you determine how much you will be spending on toner cartridges.

Toner cartridges can sometimes prove to be more expensive than the printer because they come with different page yields and price tags. The number of pages you intend to print with a single cartridge is what we refer to as page yield.

We recommend dividing the printer’s page yield by the price of the ink cartridge to determine the printer’s cost per page.

If you intend to find a good black and white printer and still save money on printing, consider using toner cartridge replacements that are compatible.

3.    Speed

The print speed of the desired printer should be an important consideration even though speed widely varies between different black and white printers.

Most cost-effective printers tend to print at a speed of 25-50 pages/minute, which can prove adequate for business purposes.

You can also find high-end models that can produce an average of 100 pages/minute. To determine the best model for you in terms of speed, you have to determine your level of output as well.

Printers with faster speeds can be a bit expensive, so you have to take a good look at your printing needs and habits. This will help you decide how fast you want to print, and how much you want to spend to attain a laser printer with this kind of speed.

4.    Accepted Paper/Media Size

Most users will purchase black and white printers for office purposes and settings. In which case, most laser printers can handle legal-size media or paper.

However, some compact models are only designed for home use. Therefore, if legal size printing is a requirement for you, you might want to take time and research paper size specs before walking into a store and buying a new black and white printer.

Users who want to print sizes slightly larger than legal size may need to consider buying a specialty printer instead.

5.    Networking Capability

In the current market, nearly all laser printers feature multiple connectivity options. Over the past years, USB has been the primary interface, and every laptop or computer features several USB ports.

In most cases, the printed is to be placed near your laptop or pc because the USB is essentially a short, direct connection.

The good news is, there are also wireless routes that feature USB ports that you can also use to connect to your printer and easily enable wireless printing from the comfort of your office or home network.

Various mobile devices can share multiple modern laser printers in your home or office through a network.

You will also find printers with Ethernet ports. The Ethernet port allows you to connect a cable to a switch in your network or your router. It also helps allow for a faster connection.

Ethernets are, however, commonly efficient for the office environment. Hence, you can opt for a low-end model with a built-in Ethernet port if you are looking for a home-use printer.

Laser printers with Wi-Fi connectivity features have also become very popular. In fact, most printers meant for home or small business will come equipped with Wi-Fi capabilities.

Some printers feature the Wi-Fi Direct option that allows you to connect your printer to your network fast.

Printers with Wi-Fi capabilities can easily connect to smartphones, digital cameras, and tablets. There are some printers that also support mobile printing.

Near-Field Communication {NFC} is also another feature available in some black and white printers. This feature allows you to connect the printer to your tablet or smartphone by merely touching the mobile device to a specific area on the laser printer.

6.    Duplexing

One of the most common features in black and white printers is the duplexing feature. We consider automatic duplexing in laser printers a big plus.

Duplexing refers to scanning or printing both sides of a page without needing to flip the page over manually. In printers with this feature, this is achieved by print the front page of a page and then pulling it back through the laser printer, flipping it over, and then printing the back page.

Duplexing with be a significant convenience for those who often need to scan two-sided pages. In which, duplexing is almost necessary these days because it helps you save on paper usage.

7.    Ease of Use

We live in a world where almost everyone uses a touch screen phone, a tablet, and sometimes even a laptop. Doesn’t it make more sense to get a touch screen printer as well?

A touch screen will make it so much easier for you to navigate the printer’s settings or menu system. This feature is particularly useful for printers with built-in access to applications that require you to input your login details.

To ensure further ease of use, you should also consider how swiftly you can access the paper tray as well, and how easy it is to load paper on the tray.

You might also want to check how the toner cartridges are changed on that particular model. The last thing you need is a printer that you can’t easily change the toner cartridges when the need arises.

8.    Paper Handling

How much paper can the printer handle? Most laser printers can handle A4 size. Therefore, if you are looking to print A3-sized documents, you might want to find specific models that can allow this.

If you are considering printing out more substantial papers or envelopes, we recommend finding a printer with a multi-purpose tray.

However, even with the option of a multi-purpose tray, you will still have to check the laser printer’s specifications and find out the weight of paper the printer can handle as well as the number of envelopes you can load on the tray.

Users who are always printing or busy offices need to have enough paper in their printers all the time. The last thing you want to do is have first to fill up the tray with paper when you are in a hurry.

Busy printer users should opt for trays that don’t require regular filling. Hence, for the number of users estimated to print, make sure the printer you are eyeing has the capacity for that number.

To satisfy growing needs, you might want to consider buying a printer that can be expanded through a second or even third tray.

9.    Noise Emissions and Power Consumption

Unless you see the laser printer in action at a retailer or showroom with a low noise floor, it can be a bit hard to evaluate the noise emissions of a printer. However, this is something you should be mindful of especially when buying a big black and white printer.

The noise the printer produce when the engine starts up and churns through the paper is very important, especially for users who can’t stand loud noises.

Some brands list the printer’s noise level for different models in decimals. You can use this as a guide to figure out how looking the model will be when setting up and in use.

It is also essential to consider the power usage of the printer as well. This is more so why you should consider a printer with a deep sleep mode. Find a printer that can always assess how much power it is using every time it’s actively printing. We recommend models that are Energy Star Compliant.

10. Processor and Memory

Comparing processors between printers is not an easy task. However, you can always check the quoted speed in megahertz to determine how much power the printer has to run inbuilt functions and process jobs at the same time.

We also recommend finding a black and white printer with an upgraded memory capacity if you intend to use the printer for design applications and graphics, especially when using PortScript or PCL languages for printing. This is crucial because to store the print information as its being converted requires space.

11. Memory Card Slots, the Cloud, and PictBridge

If you intend to print a lot of black and white photos, then consider a laser printer with Bluetooth capabilities, built-in memory slots, cloud-based support, or PictBridge.

These features will allow you to print photos from your digital camera or smart devices directly. This makes your work much easier because you don’t have to transfer the pictures to your PC first.

Memory cards can also be easily popped into a slot on your black and white printer. In fact, some printers feature a multi-function card reader, SD format, or Secure Digital.

If your camera is PictBridge enabled, you can easily plug it into a printer with a USB cable is the printer features a PictBridge-enable USB port. The cloud-based connectivity features prove efficient when you have to send photos directly from your Dropbox, Google Cloud Print, or other internet-enabled services.

However, don’t overestimate how useful these features can be. This is because you might still need to transfer photos to your PC or laptop to empty the memory card. In this case, as a photographer, you might want to your print photos on a bigger screen before you print them out.

AIO laser printers can also offer you internet-enabled features that will allow you to access photos stored on Google Drive, Flickr, and Dropbox. You can also find models that will enable remote printing and easy access to arts and crafts you need to print.

However, these said services can only be accessed or print if your printer is connected to the internet remotely from mobile devices.

12. Size and Ease of Installation

Typical office printers can be cumbersome and bulky and therefore hard to move around. In most cases, you need the help of someone else to move the printer.

It is therefore vital to consider the overall size of the printer before purchasing one as well as where you intend to install the printer.

Better yet, you might want to consider settling for a compact printer that will better suit your space and still provide ultimate functionality.

You might also want to know how easy it is to load paper onto the tray and to install toner cartridges to minimize the amount of time you use every time you have to do this.

Best Black and White Printers

1.  HP LaserJet Pro M402N – Best Black and White Printer for Business Hardware

This monochrome printer will let you print, copy, scan, and fax, all at an equally affordable price. It comes with impressive features such as a duplexer for easy two-sided page printing, fax functionality, and, an ADF for copying and scanning multiple pages.

For the price, we find the fax capability a bit unexpected but equally important. It bears above-average print speed, detailed graphics, and razor-sharp text.

You may notice that their single-side copying is one of the fastest you will experience with AIO printer. The only downside is that the control panel is a bit clumsy.

However, for the price, the performance is exceptional. The printer’s main input drawer can hold up to 250 sheets. It also features a 10-sheet tray at the back for specialty media.

The image quality is high, and the printed text appears razor-sharp. Letterforms appear dark, with crisp edges and the graphics look detailed, with rich darks and even mid-tone transitions.

The control panel features a 2-line monochrome LCD screen, dedicated buttons for faxing and copying, and menu navigation buttons. It also features an ADF feature built into the printer’s hinged lid sitting on top of the scanner glass.

You can also easily print documents and photos from your mobile devices as long as the printer is connected to your network. You can also easily print documents from your phone from the HP Smart app if you are not as conversant with other applications like Adobe Acrobat.

Pros

• High image quality
• Fast document feeder
• Impressive print speeds
• Fast copying

Cons

• Slow startup
• Slow scanning
• Frustrating wireless setup

Check Price on Amazon

2. Brother HL-L2390DW – Best Budge Black and White Printer

Another model from Brother. This HL-L2390DW monochrome, AIO, laser printer offers you a low price of entry. Even though it is an affordable option, the features and performance live up to our standards.

It also guarantees low operating costs seeing that when using a standard-capacity toner cartridge, the cost per page is 3.7 cents and 2.7 cents for a high-capacity toner.

This monochrome printer also handles copies and scans fast. The setup is also effortless. Beginners will find the quick setup guide very easy to understand.

It produces sharp text documents, well-defined edges, and allows printing with dark letterforms. The graphics also attractive and photo production are very impressive.

This model mainly makes black and white printing in PDF format appear authentic and sharp, just like the original. You can quickly scan photos at 600 dpi to formats like JPEG with color accuracy and exquisite detailing.

Pros

• High image quality
• Low cost per page
• Fast black and white printing and scanning
• Impressive color scanning speed

Cons

• No fax capability
• No document feeder

Check Price on Amazon

3.  Brother HLL6200DW – Best High-Quality Black and White Printer

If reputation is anything to go by, you might want to consider Brother a reliable brand. This printer is perfect for those looking for a monochrome printer that can pack some hefty printing punch.

The standard interface requires you to use the ‘start’ and ‘stop’ buttons which are easy to grasp and useful to have. You can save yourself both time and money by simply pressing the ‘stop’ button the minute you realize you may have made a mistake.

This monochrome printer supports 802.11b/n/g wireless networks which are an essential accessory to have. The most you are required to do is enter your name and user password, and you can easily link your printer to your network with the fuss of running cables.

Whether you opt for the wireless networking or Ethernet port, Brother provides you with features that can allow you to use either of these features instantly.

It also supports AirPrint, Brother iPrint, Wi-Fi Direct, Google Cloud Print, and Cortado Workplace printing which makes it one of the most compatible printers in the market.

This printer is speedy 48 ppm, which makes it one of the fastest monochrome printers currently. It features a built-in tray that can handle 570 pages.

We particularly love that it is also very affordable and bears a significant low cost per page, with a full-duplex feature that allows printing on both sides.

Pros

• Affordable
• Perfect for heavy printing
• Reliable brand

Cons

• A little large

Check Price on Amazon

Best Black and White Printers Conclusion

If you want a good laser printer, it’s difficult to ignore a quality black and white printer. They offer you all sorts of advantages such a better document quality and cheaper printing costs per page.

The above listed monochrome printers are some of the best models, whether you need a printer for your small office or home use. They are also equally affordable options.

We evaluated the ease of use and cost, speed, and printing quality to make sure these printers would suit the needs of anyone looking for a well-performing monochrome printer.