Inkjet printer better to be on all the time?

[Drumroll]

What are peoples thoughts is it more economical to leave a printer on standby all time or is it better to just switch it on only when needed?

[abzmike]

I leave mine on, can’t believe it draws much when it’s just sitting doing nothing but dozing on wifi.

[Zad]

I believe fairly recent ones with ink tanks do a full clean cycle every time they are powered up, which can use quite a lot of ink.

[Whataguy]

I power mine on every day, I know someone who only powered theirs up once a month or so and it gummed up and never worked when they needed it.

I have an ink tank printer, the ink is so cheap on these that a cleaning cycle doesn't cost much. I still have some of the ink left since the original free fill up two years ago from the ink in the box, it's mainly the black that needs topped up.

[megaphone]

All those 5-10w on standby soon add up. My base power load is 160w, so I try and keep things off I can.

The issue is the cleaning cycle they tend to do when powering on, my Epson does this, so I tend to leave it on so it does not eat the ink. Although I'm printing less these days so really should power it off.

[Dr Mike Oxgreen]

Our old HP inkjet printer was shocking on standby, about 7 Watts.

The new one we’ve now got is much better, about 2 Watts. I leave it on all the time, although it puts itself to sleep. I have a reminder set up to do a head clean every 2 weeks because it gets very little usage.