How to Get More From Your Printed Page

At Toner Giant, we’re often asked – how many pages can I print from such-and-such cartridge? First off, there’s no definitive answer – the amount of pages a cartridge can print varies.

Printer cartridges produce a set number of sheets based on 5% page coverage. This percentage determines the cartridge’s page yield, which is simply an estimation of how many sheets a single cartridge is able to produce, as calculated by the original equipment manufacturer (OEM).

If you want to get more from your printed page, read on while we explore printer cartridge page yields in a bit more detail.

 
Office printer
 

5% Coverage: What Is It and Where Does It Come From?

In the early days of printing, OEMs and MFPs (multifunction products) devised their own methods of determining printer cartridge yield. Naturally, with such varying test conditions, inaccuracies and discrepancies quickly developed from manufacturer to manufacturer – thus, a universal solution to calculating page yield was needed.

Enter ISO (the International Organisation for Standardisation), who developed a standard document capable of measuring print yield across a range of printers and manufacturers. Named ISO/IEC 24712:2007, the five-page document contains a number of standard printed documents – including letters and presentational documents – which help printer manufacturers calculate page yield in a controlled, measured environment.

 

How Do These ISO Standards Help Consumers?

The ISO standards require each OEM to test a number of its products to calculate average page yield across a broad range of different cartridges. By using the ISO’s specially developed set of documents, manufacturers can quickly and easily calculate average page yield – essentially by printing each document until the cartridge has ran out of toner.

The resulting yield gives customers a general idea of how many sheets they can expect to print from a single cartridge. Often, manufacturers will include the ISO-calculated yield on the cartridge packaging – helping customers make a better-informed decision on the cartridge that’s right for them.

It’s important to remember however, that the amount of pages you can actually print may vary greatly from the stated page yield. Why? ISO’s test documents are specifically designed to produce maximum page yield, and are likely much different to the sorts of documents you’ll be printing at home. For example, if you print lots of photographs, the page yield will likely be much lower than the one advertised on the cartridge’s packaging.

To borrow an analogy from Lexmark’s in-depth guide to understanding cartridge page yields; they liken page yield to the expected MPG (miles per gallon) of a car. Sure, a car may be capable of 50mpg, but in “real world” conditions, the average motorist is unlikely to ever achieve this.

 

Is It Possible to Improve Printer Cartridge Yields at Home?

In a word, yes; there are a number of things you can do to increase the amount of pages a cartridge is capable of printing. Here, we’ll explore some of these methods to help you reap every last drop of available ink or toner from your printer cartridges.

Coverage

In short, coverage represents the percentage of a page that’s covered in toner. For black text documents, industry experts have calculated the coverage percentage to be around 4% to 5%, whilst this figure is usually much higher when printing images. Remember – the lower the page coverage percentage, the greater the overall page yield.

Font

If you want to get more from your printed page, it may be time to shelve that favourite font and choose one that’s proven to increase printer cartridge yield. Typically, serif fonts – Calibri, Times New Roman – are thought to garner better yields than san-serif – Century Gothic, Calibri. Why? Serif fonts are usually thinner, meaning less toner is required to reproduce them on a page. They also take up less horizontal space, meaning you can fit more words on to a line.

Job Size

During the print process, most laser printers consume a small amount of toner. By increasing the overall job size, you can effectively reduce the amount of toner the printer consumes. How? Toner is consumed whenever the printer is running, so grouping print jobs together instead of doing them individually will save toner and effectively ramp up the total page yield.

 

For more hints and tips on how to get more from your printer, be sure to check out the Toner Giant blog. Alternatively, visit our homepage to browse our range of affordable toner cartridges, printers and consumables, or call the Toner Giant team on 0845 365 3605.

     

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