Printer Not Printing? How to Fix It on Windows

When a printer refuses to print, it's usually one of three things: a job is stuck in the print queue, Windows thinks the printer is offline, or the driver is broken. Here's how to work through each, starting with the quickest checks.

1. Check the printer itself

• Look for paper, ink or toner, and any paper jam warning. If the printer's screen shows an error, deal with that first.
• Turn both the printer and the PC off and on again.
• For a USB printer, try another port. For a wireless printer, make sure it's on the same Wi-Fi network as your PC.

2. Make sure you're printing to the right printer

In the print dialog, check the printer name. It's common to find "Microsoft Print to PDF" or an old printer selected. In Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Printers & scanners, turn off Let Windows manage my default printer, then select your printer and choose Set as default.

3. Clear the print queue

1. Go to Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Printers & scanners and select your printer.
2. Select Open print queue.
3. Right-click any stuck jobs and choose Cancel. Once the queue is empty, print again.

While you're in the queue window, check its menu for Use printer offline. If it's ticked, untick it; with that on, nothing prints even when the printer is ready.

4. Restart the Print Spooler

If jobs won't delete or stay on "Printing" forever, restart the service that manages them.

1. Press Win + R, type services.msc and press Enter.
2. Right-click Print Spooler and choose Stop.
3. In File Explorer, go to C:\Windows\System32\spool\PRINTERS and delete the files inside (not the folder itself).
4. Right-click Print Spooler again and choose Start.

Or do the same thing from an admin Command Prompt:

net stop spooler
del /Q /F %systemroot%\System32\spool\PRINTERS\*
net start spooler

5. Run the printer troubleshooter

Go to Settings > System > Troubleshoot > Other troubleshooters and run Printer. On Windows 11 it runs through the Get Help app. On Windows 10, look under Settings > Update & Security > Troubleshoot > Additional troubleshooters.

6. Wireless printer shows as offline

• Restarting a router can give the printer a new IP address, which breaks the connection. Use the printer's own screen or app to reconnect it to Wi-Fi.
• Removing and re-adding the printer in Windows makes it pick up the new address.
• If your router supports it, reserving a fixed IP address for the printer stops this from happening again.

7. Reinstall the driver

1. In Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Printers & scanners, select the printer and choose Remove.
2. Restart the PC.
3. Download the latest driver for your exact model from the manufacturer's support site (HP, Canon, Epson, Brother and so on).
4. Install it, then use Add device to add the printer again.

Stick to the manufacturer's official site for drivers. Our driver update guide explains why.

FAQ

A test page prints, but one document won't.

The file may be the problem. Save it as a PDF and print that, or open it in a different app. Very large PDFs can choke some printers; try compressing the PDF first.

It stopped working after a Windows update.

Reinstall the latest driver from the maker's site first. Removing the update from Settings > Windows Update > Update history > Uninstall updates is possible, but keep security updates whenever you can.

My office's shared printer won't connect.

Check that you're on the same network and that your network profile is set to Private. On a work PC, ask your IT admin rather than changing settings yourself.