On our arithmetic the Canon PIXMA MegaTank G3270 has the cheapest color page of any printer we cover, at about 0.8 of a cent for a full ISO color page, with Epson’s 522 range at roughly 0.4 of a cent mono and about 1.1 cents in color. Every number below is a published bottle price divided by a manufacturer-rated page yield, and both inputs are shown.
How these figures are built
There is no measurement involved and no estimate. For a mono page we take the black bottle price and divide it by the black bottle’s rated yield. For a full color page we add one black page to three color-channel pages, because a color page draws on cyan, magenta and yellow as well as black. That is it, and it is why every figure here can be checked against the manufacturer in about a minute. The method in full.
Every tank printer we cover, per page
| Printer | Ink | Mono per page | ISO color per page | List price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Canon PIXMA MegaTank G3270 | GI-21 | ~0.3¢ | ~0.8¢ | $248.99 |
| Epson EcoTank ET-2400 | 522 | ~0.4¢ | ~1.1¢ | $189.99 |
| Epson EcoTank ET-2800 | 522 | ~0.4¢ | ~1.1¢ | $239.99 |
| Epson EcoTank ET-4800 | 522 | ~0.4¢ | ~1.1¢ | Not published |
| Epson EcoTank ET-2850 | 502 | ~0.3¢ | ~1.2¢ | $349.99 |
| Epson EcoTank ET-3850 | 502 | ~0.3¢ | ~1.2¢ | Not published |
| Epson EcoTank ET-4950 | 502 | ~0.3¢ | ~1.2¢ | $499.99 |
| Epson EcoTank Photo ET-8550 | 552 | ~0.4¢ | ~1.4¢ | $749.99 |
| HP Smart Tank 7001 | 32XL / 31 | Not published | Not published | Not published |
Our arithmetic on manufacturer-published bottle prices and rated yields read on 27 September 2026. Color figures add one black channel plus three color channels. The HP row is blank because HP did not publish bottle prices we could read - we will not estimate them.
Note the HP row, and note what it means. The Smart Tank 7001 is a genuine refillable tank printer and its bottles are rated at about 6,000 black and 8,000 color pages, but HP did not publish prices we could read on the support page we used, so there is no cost per page here. An empty cell is the honest answer; a guess would not be.
The bottles behind every figure
| Bottle | Rated yield | Price we read | Per page |
|---|---|---|---|
| Canon GI-21 pigment black ink bottle | 6,000 pages | $17.99 | ~0.3¢ |
| Canon GI-21 color ink bottle | 7,700 pages | $12.99 | per color channel |
| Epson 522 black ink bottle | 4,500 pages | $17.99 | ~0.4¢ |
| Epson 522 color ink bottle | 7,500 pages | $17.99 | per color channel |
| Epson 502 black ink bottle | 7,500 pages | $24.99 | ~0.3¢ |
| Epson 552 black ink bottle | 6,700 pages | $23.99 | ~0.4¢ |
Prices and rated yields read from Epson US and Canon on 27 September 2026, recorded in our supply registry. Yields are rated at ISO/IEC 24712 for ink, which assumes standard test coverage - a dense page costs more.
Tank ink against toner, and against cartridges
A tank printer wins on color by a distance and loses to a mono laser on nothing much except reliability through disuse. Our figures put a mono page at 0.4 of a cent on 522 ink against about 3.3 cents on a Brother TN830XL — so the tank is cheaper per mono page too, as long as the printer is used often enough to stay healthy.
Against cartridges there is no contest, and Toner Buzz describes the market we are comparing against: about 7.5 cents a page mono and about 20 cents a page color for inkjet printing generally. Those are their numbers, not ours, and they are the reason a tank printer that costs more on the shelf costs less by the end of its first year. The full comparison.
What that means over three years
At 150 pages a month, two thirds of them mono, the 522 ink behind the ET-2800 comes to $14 for the mono share alone, and the color share is a few dollars more on top. The same volume on a Brother mono laser is $118, and on the Canon 125 cartridge in a cheap laser it is $218.
Which is the useful conclusion for anyone choosing: the cheapest printer to run is a tank printer if you print color at all, and a mono laser if you never do. The expensive mistake is a cartridge machine in either case. The full ranking.