Whether you need to print labels, receipts or other small paper notes, the best thermal printers are incredibly useful to have around. These small, lightweight devices are typically very reliable - more so even than standard home printers - in that they require minimal maintenance and don’t use ink cartridges or toner: all you need is paper and the printer itself.
We’ve compared all the most popular thermal printers at a variety of price points, considering their specs, features and performance, as well as a variety of use cases. For example, we’ve included the best label printers and best cheap thermal printers, weighing up the pros and cons to help you make an educated decision.
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This is our top pick for everyday use for most people because we've found it to be easy to set up and conveniently compact in size while the high resolution produces crisp and clear labels in a wide range of sizes, including shipping labels up to 4 inches wide. Read more below
This compact thermal printer is pretty easy to set up, and makes for a fantastic budget option for smaller businesses. Its Labelife editing software (Windows-only) allows you to customise your labels, and the printer offers great sizing versatility and 12 hours of battery life. Its main drawback is the lack of Bluetooth connectivity. Read more below
The Arkscan 2054A is for anyone who wants a basic but approachable thermal printer. With a super-quick, super-easy setup that takes no longer than a few minutes, it's not fancy, but it does the job if you need to print legible, clear 6 x 4-inch shipping labels daily. Read more below
We think this larger thermal printer is a sound choice for businesses that might need to produce large numbers of stickers and labels in a range of sizes at a rapid pace. The resulting resolution is lower, but this makes it cost-effective and also very efficient, printing at up to 72 labels per minute. Read more below
The Brother PT-P710BT is a smart, compact little thermal printer that can be used to create narrow, plastic labels. You're tied into using Brother's own TZe tapes but these work well and come in 60 different colours and sizes ranging from 6mm to one inch. Read more below
The best thermal colour printer we've found, the Brother VC-500W is a great, flexible choice when it comes to printing labels, offering various sizes ranging from 9-50mm width. They can be up to 50cm long, and the print quality remains high. Read more below
We rate the Dymo LabelWriter 4XL as the best thermal label printer overall. It's a compact printer, not too large to sit on a desk, and the black cover and silver edging looks pretty sleek good.
It’s simple to set up, producing crisp and clear labels with its high resolution of 300dpi. While the Dymo 4XL printer has the ability to print labels in a range of sizes, it's best equipped to print larger shipping labels up to 4-inches wide. This goes hand-in-hand with its compatibility with many major online marketplaces and shipping platforms – it can print shipping labels directly from platforms like Amazon and eBay.
There are over 60 available label styles and formats, along with a wide variety of fonts and styles to choose from. We also found it quick to print, achieving around 29 labels per minute. This makes a convenient choice if you have a large printing task to undertake.
The Phomemo PM-246 Pro is a very compact thermal printer, although you might have to take into consideration the extra space needed for the label holder. It's relatively easy to set up, coming with a USB containing how-to videos, quick guides and drivers so you shouldn’t have any issues with connecting. However, there is no Bluetooth connectivity so you won’t be able to print directly from your smartphone or tablet.
The printer comes with Labelife editing software which is great for customising your labels. However, just like some of the other printers’ software, this is only available for Windows users currently. That said, it is extremely versatile when it comes to printing, with the ability to print labels from 1 x 1-inches up to 6 x 4-inches, covering the majority of most commonly used labels – it also comes with a free label holder and some 4 x 6-inches fan-fold labels to get you started.
The Phomemo PM-246 Pro is a great budget thermal printer for everyday labelling and printing as it’s built for high volume with its ability to run for up to 12 hours straight. Although it doesn’t offer Bluetooth connectivity, as long as you want your printer hooked up to a computer, it's a sound choice.
The Arkscan 2054A is for anyone who wants an approachable thermal printer. We found it to be super easy to set up, taking only minutes. It offers nothing fancy, but it does the job for any business that needs to print 6 x 4-inch shipping labels daily.
We found the printer to be fast, printing around 5-inches per second. Though it is slightly bigger than some of the other printer options, it does have the option to use a label roll which is stored in the printer as well as fan-fold stacks. This printer also has the option to make it compatible with Zebra LP2844, meaning it will support some software.
The printer comes with software included; BarTender UltraLite Label Making Software, with features for text and graphics. However, this is only available for Windows users so if you use a Mac then not all of these printers’ features will be accessible. Overall, it's a versatile thermal printer, with the option to buy a LAN version (at an extra cost) so you can print wireless rather than via USB.
The MUNBYN Thermal Shipping Label Printer is desktop-sized, and while it's larger than some other options and not wireless, we think it's perfect for small businesses thanks to its efficiency and cost-effectiveness.
Measuring 7.6 x 4.1 x 3.9in, it is smaller than many regular desktop printers, and it's compatible with popular software and platforms including Adobe, Microsoft, Etsy, eBay, and a lot more. The MUNBYN label printer is fast, at up to 72 labels per minute, and the printing quality remains high. It can create stickers and other sized labels as well as the standard 6 x 4 inches, and the printer comes with a USB which includes a detailed printer installation video tutorial and driver.
The Brother PT-P710BT is a smart, compact little thermal printer that can be used to create narrow, plastic labels. You're tied into using Brother's own TZe tapes but these work well and come in 60 different colours and sizes ranging from 6 millimetres to one inch.
It's a wonderfully compact thermal printer, and it can be used with desktop and mobile devices, but it's size and nature make it ideal for use with Android or Apple devices. While it can be used over Bluetooth, it's also nice that you can have the USB 2.0 connected there as a backup (although USB-C would be preferable). Another plus point is the app, which offers icons, images, barcodes, logos and more – there's even a spellchecker.
The Brother VC-500W full colour label printer is the best thermal colour printer we've found. We consider it a great, flexible choice when it comes to printing labels, offering various sizes ranging from 9-50mm width and they can be up to 50cm long, and the print quality remains high, at 313DPI.
We found it easy to print directly from most devices and operating systems, including straight from social media platforms. We also liked the free Colour Label Editor app, which you can download to edit your photos and choose from thousands of personalised features such as text, borders, filters and emojis.
One of the main downsides to this thermal printer is that the printing rolls are not cheap to purchase, which can make it quite costly to run. However, as long as your labelling tasks aren't too high-volume, the Brother VC-500W is a great pick for colour label printing.
If you're looking for the best thermal printer for receipts and don't really need one for much else, the Epson TM-T20II is an excellent thermal printer, and is considered one of the best around.
It's a popular thermal printer for small businesses because it's a sturdy, reliable and speedy (200mm per second) thermal printer for receipts. It can be used with Windows and Mac but doesn't have a mobile app or support for Android. It prints on paper at lengths of 3.125 inches wide and up to 230 inches long.
The Zebra 4 is a good, modern thermal printer that can support the larger four-inch label side and has a fast 4.25' per second speed to keep those labels coming when you're up against a deadline. This is one of the best thermal printers if you need a fast label maker with consistent and reliable results.
It's a modern machine, with a compact and sleek design and cartridges are easily replaced. It looks good on your desk and once up and running is easy to use with the app. This is also one of the frustrations, as setting up this machine can be a little frustrating. It only works with the app, so like many modern printers you need good WiFi and a second device (laptop, tablet, phone) to get it up and running.
When choosing the best thermal printer for you, you need to consider several factors. Most importantly, you need to have clear what you want to use it for, and at what volume. You might want to invest in a thermal printer for a small business, or a big commercial operation. Or you just want to label and organise things around their home. This will dictate how much volume of printing you'll need and how flexible the printer needs to be.
In this light, think about print speed and label size compatibility. Businesses are more likely to need to print shipping labels and will need a thermal printer that can accommodate this. But if you just want a printer to label and organise, you can save money with a printer that focuses on smaller-scale printing.
Another deciding factor might be whether the thermal printer has USB or wireless connectivity. If you want to be able to print from mobile devices, wireless is the way to go, but this improved portability costs more.
When we test thermal printers, we put them through their paces to ensure they deliver what the manufacturers promise, by carrying out day-to-day tasks such as printing labels, receipts and documents.
While the machines print, we measure the print speed against the manufacturer's claims, and assess the print quality and resolution of the results. We also compare the volume of the printers during operation, the ease of use, and maintenance of different thermal printers, as well as the energy efficiency.
Otherwise, it's about ensuring we're trying a wide variety of devices at different price points to build a firm idea of what represents the best value against performance.
Thermal printers are ideal for businesses and professional crafters and artists as well as hobbyists that need a printer for specific tasks, such as to print labels or receipts. Thermal printing fades over time, so it's not ideal for printing things that need more durability.
How do thermal printers work?
Thermal printers work in a different way to standard home printers, which tend to use laser or inkjet technology. Thermal printers use heat to transfer pigments onto a surface, turning the coating of the thermal paper black in the areas where it's heated.
What are the advantages of thermal printer?
The big advantage of thermal printers is that there's no need to buy ink cartridges; you just need the paper and the printer itself. They're also smaller and lighter than most regular printers.
On the other hand, the disadvantages of thermal printers are that they're often more expensive to buy than standard printers, and, while you don't need to buy ink, you do need to buy thermal paper rather than regular paper. They also have colour limitations, and thermal printing fades over time.
