Compare the four brands by ink system, not logo. Bulk-ink tanks (Epson EcoTank, Canon MegaTank) run about 0.3¢ per black page and 0.9¢ per color page per PCMag's 2026 bulk-ink figure. HP's Instant Ink charges monthly by page count, and Brother competes on laser toner — the cheapest Brother listing we track is $25.99 for 12,000 pages. Tanks post the lowest per-page cost at typical home volumes.
"Which brand is cheapest?" is the wrong question. HP, Canon, Epson, and Brother each lead with a different ink system: Epson and Canon sell refillable tanks, HP pushes a page-count subscription, and Brother leans on laser toner. We reviewed five 2026 sources — RTINGS, STP Texas, Castle Ink, PriceHacker, and PCMag — and cross-checked them against our printer-ink tracker ranked by price per page. The per-page math splits along system lines, not brand lines.
System 1: Bulk-Ink Tanks — Epson EcoTank and Canon MegaTank
Our tracking backs the tank thesis at the price floor. Most of the fifteen cheapest in-stock printer-ink listings we track are bottled tank ink — titles cite compatibility with Epson 502, Epson 522, T502, and ET-series tanks like the ET-2850/ET-3760/ET-3850. The cheapest is Faslvink's 30,000-page refill set at $19.99 on Amazon: $19.99 ÷ 30,000 pages = $0.00067 per page. Next is OKGO!INK's 522 bottle set at $16.79 for 18,000 pages: $16.79 ÷ 18,000 = $0.00093 per page.
Canon is the gap in our data: no Canon cartridge or bottle appears among the fifteen cheapest listings we track, so for Canon per-page costs we rely on PCMag's class-level claim rather than a tracked price.
Top Picks by $/page
View all →| # | Product | Capacity | $/page | Price | Retailer |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Faslvink Compatible Ink Refill Bottles Replacement for Epson 502 Ink Black | 30 TB | $0.00067/page | $19.99 | Amazon |
| 2 | Faslvink Compatible Ink Refill Bottles Replacement for Epson 522 Ink Black | 24 TB | $0.00075/page | $17.96 | Amazon |
| 3 | 522 Ink Refill Bottles Compatible Replacement for epson 522 Ink ET-2800 Ink | 18 TB | $0.00093/page | $16.79 | Amazon |
| 4 | imtfzct Replacement for Epson 502 Ink Refill Bottles for ET-3760 ET2760 ET2750 ET-4760 ET-2850 ET-15000 ST-4000 ST-2000 ET-3710 ET-3850 ET-3750 ET-4850 ET4750 ET2700 ST3000 ET3700 Printer (2BK C M Y) | 17 TB | $0.0011/page | $17.99 | Amazon |
| 5 | Ink Refill Bottles ET-2850 ET-3760 ET-3850 (5 Pack) for ET 2850 ET3850 4850 | 19 TB | $0.0013/page | $24.99 | Amazon |
Faslvink Compatible Ink Refill Bottles Replacement for Epson 502 Ink Black
30 TB · Amazon
$0.00067/page
$19.99
Faslvink Compatible Ink Refill Bottles Replacement for Epson 522 Ink Black
24 TB · Amazon
$0.00075/page
$17.96
522 Ink Refill Bottles Compatible Replacement for epson 522 Ink ET-2800 Ink
18 TB · Amazon
$0.00093/page
$16.79
imtfzct Replacement for Epson 502 Ink Refill Bottles for ET-3760 ET2760 ET2750 ET-4760 ET-2850 ET-15000 ST-4000 ST-2000 ET-3710 ET-3850 ET-3750 ET-4850 ET4750 ET2700 ST3000 ET3700 Printer (2BK C M Y)
17 TB · Amazon
$0.0011/page
$17.99
Ink Refill Bottles ET-2850 ET-3760 ET-3850 (5 Pack) for ET 2850 ET3850 4850
19 TB · Amazon
$0.0013/page
$24.99
System 2: Subscription Ink — HP Instant Ink
PriceHacker's 2026 cost-per-page roundup notes that HP Instant Ink plans start at a low monthly fee for a small page allotment, and that HP charges by pages printed rather than by cartridge. That pricing structure is why a clean per-page comparison fails here: none of the evidence publishes a page-count denominator for the entry plan, so no honest $/page figure can be derived from it.
The fix is arithmetic you do yourself. Take the monthly fee for a plan, divide by the pages included that month, and compare the quotient to the tank benchmark of $0.003 per black page. If your quotient lands above $0.003, the subscription is the pricier system at your volume; if it lands below, it competes. The quotient moves with your print habits — which is why HP's true per-page price isn't printed on the box.
System 3: Laser Toner — Brother, and HP's Other Half
RTINGS' "The 5 Best Printers With Cheap Ink of 2026" sketches the hardware landscape: the excerpt names at least five Epson EcoTank models (ET-2980, ET-3950, ET-2800/ET-2803, ET-5850, ET-8550), at least five Brother models — four of them L-series laser-class like the HL-L2460DW and MFC-L3780CDW — and four Canon models: the Color imageCLASS MF665Cdw, PIXMA MG3620, imagePROGRAF PRO-310, and PIXMA TR4720/TR4722.
Our tracked toner floors: the cheapest HP listing is SuppliesMAX toner for the HP LaserJet P4015/P4015DN at $42.99 for 24,000 pages on Newegg — $42.99 ÷ 24,000 = $0.0018 per page. The cheapest Brother listing is SuppliesMAX toner for the Brother DCP-8070 at $25.99 for 12,000 pages — $25.99 ÷ 12,000 = $0.0022 per page, a $0.0004-per-page gap in HP's favor. Both are monochrome toner, so color printing is a separate calculation.
How to Calculate Cost Per Page for Any Cartridge or Bottle
Cost per page = price ÷ rated page yield. A $25.99 bottle set rated for 12,000 pages costs $25.99 ÷ 12,000 = $0.0022 per page. Run this division on every ink or toner purchase before you buy — it is the single number that makes brands comparable.
Two caveats keep the formula honest. Rated yields are measured on standardized test pages that use less ink than photo-heavy or graph-heavy real documents, so your realized cost per page runs higher than the label. And yields vary by model, so check each model's rated page yield to confirm the per-page cost for your workload.
Then shop by yield bucket instead of brand. If you print roughly 100 pages a month, a 1,000-page capacity supply is a ten-month buffer; the tracked bottle sets at 9,000–30,000 pages are multi-year purchases for most homes. Our per-page floors come from the cheapest in-stock listings across retailers — how we compute those floors is documented separately.
Three-Year Total Cost at Real Print Volumes
Here is the same math scaled to three print volumes. Every row uses either PCMag's published per-page figure or a tracked listing floor; toner rows are monochrome.
| Ink system | Basis | 1,000 pages | 5,000 pages | 10,000 pages |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tank, OEM-class (black) | 0.3¢/page (PCMag) | $3.00 | $15.00 | $30.00 |
| Tank, OEM-class (color) | 0.9¢/page (PCMag) | $9.00 | $45.00 | $90.00 |
| Tank refill bottles, tracked floor | $0.0007/page (DB) | $0.70 | $3.50 | $7.00 |
| HP laser toner, tracked | $0.0018/page (DB) | $1.80 | $9.00 | $18.00 |
| Brother laser toner, tracked | $0.0022/page (DB) | $2.20 | $11.00 | $22.00 |
Sample check: $0.003 × 5,000 = $15.00, and $0.0007 × 10,000 = $7.00. Instant Ink is excluded because no derivable per-page figure exists in the evidence.
Two costs the table omits. PCMag cautions that bulk-ink printers cost much more upfront than cartridge-based models with similar speed and features — none of our sources publish printer prices we can verify, so we won't quantify it. And Castle Ink's "What Printer Has the Cheapest Ink?" makes the lifetime point plainly: a low-upfront printer can cost far more in ink over its lifetime than a pricier printer with a lower cost per page. At 10,000 pages, the ink column spans $7.00 to $90.00 — the printer-price difference gets absorbed quickly at the top of that range.
Verdict: Which Brand Wins Per Page?
At realistic home volumes, the bulk-ink tank system posts the lowest cost per page: $0.003 per black page at PCMag's OEM-class figure, $0.0007 at our tracked compatible-bottle floor. Brother and HP compete through monochrome toner at $0.0022 and $0.0018 per page — competitive, but for black-only output. HP Instant Ink is the one system you must price yourself: divide the monthly fee by the page allowance before signing. For a straight brand-by-brand ranking with more SKUs, see HP vs Canon vs Epson vs Brother: Cheapest Ink Per Page.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which printer brand has the cheapest ink per page in 2026: HP, Canon, Epson, or Brother?
The tank class wins, and Epson holds the tracked floor. PCMag's bulk-ink figure is about 0.3¢ per black page and 0.9¢ per color page for Epson and Canon tank printers; the cheapest listing we track is an Epson-compatible bottle set at $0.0007 per page ($19.99 ÷ 30,000). HP's and Brother's cheapest tracked listings are toner, at $0.0018 and $0.0022 per page respectively.
How much does Epson EcoTank ink actually cost per page?
Per PCMag, roughly 0.3¢ per black page and 0.9¢ per color page for the bulk-ink class. Third-party bottles run lower in our tracking: Faslvink's 30,000-page set at $19.99 works out to $19.99 ÷ 30,000 = $0.00067 per page.
Is HP Instant Ink cheaper than buying regular cartridges?
Sometimes — it depends on your volume. PriceHacker notes plans start at a low monthly fee for a small page allotment, but no per-page figure is published in the evidence. Divide the monthly fee by the included pages and compare the result to the $0.003-per-page tank benchmark before committing.
Are Canon MegaTank printers as cheap per page as Epson EcoTank?
Per PCMag, the bulk-ink economics are in line across Epson and Canon tank printers, and STP Texas names both lines as the cheapest-ink answer. Canon doesn't appear in our fifteen cheapest tracked listings, so we can't verify a Canon-specific per-page price from current data.
Why does my cheap printer cost so much in ink over time?
Castle Ink's answer: a low-upfront printer can cost far more in ink over its lifetime than a pricier model with a lower cost per page. The defense is one division — price ÷ rated yield. A $42.99 toner rated for 24,000 pages ($0.0018 per page) beats a cheaper cartridge with a fraction of the yield on every page after the first.