For the best printers, you never have to look far for one that’s all-in-one. However, they’ll often come with features that’s unnecessary for home printers. If you need an all-in-one printer that’s compact, is quiet, and affordable—we present to you the HP Tango X. It handles printing documents when you need them, though is exceptional when it comes to printing photos.
Related: If you would rather buy a more portable printer, check the HP Sprocket Studio review
Why We Like It – HP Tango X
The HP Tango X is a strange all-in-one printer that marries smart home technology to printers, while keeping its design compact and affordable with an incredible ink subscription.
- Great performance for pricing
- Competitive ink pricing with Instant Ink
- Can be controlled with voice
- Extra steps for scanning and copying
- Borderless printing is limited to 5×7
Related: Check a different portable printer in this Kodak Mini 2 HD Wireless Portable Mobile Instant Photo Printer review
Performance
Print quality is unsurprisingly superb. This is HP, after all. While it does a great job printing documents and even has a nice 50 page paper tray, it really shines with photo printing; photo prints have never looked better. If you need a printer dedicated to photography, this Tango printer is where it’s at—especially when you toss in high quality photo paper and you’re on a budget. With that said, borderless printing is limited to 5×7. That doesn’t mean you can’t print photos larger than that—you absolutely can—but they’ll have borders.
Printing speed is around 11 pages for monochrome and 8 pages per minute for colored. For personal use, that’s great, but for a business? Not so much. If that’s what you’re looking for, the Brother HL-L2300D is better for business.
Design
You might be wondering where the scanner and copier are. Excluding both has reduced the overall size of the HP Tango X by a significant amount, but has added extra steps to scanning and copying. So how does it get away with being an all-in-one printer? By making your smartphone (or tablet) the scanner and copier.
Because the HP Tango X is a smart printer, it can connect to your Wi Fi. You can then control your smart home printer through apps like Google Home, the HP Smart app, even Alexa. If you don’t care for the lack of dedicated scanning and copying, check out the HP OfficeJet 5255 or the HP OfficeJet 3830.
Value
The HP Tango X Wireless Printer didn’t wow us with its performance in terms of print speeds, but that’s only if you view it through the lens of a high-traffic environment. The HP Tango X is not meant for an office; this is personal use only. That’s where its value is.
Its value is further compounded when you throw in an HP Instant Ink subscription. You’ll get ink cartridges sent to you when the printer’s ink reaches a certain level. If you nab the highest subscription package (300 pages per month at $9.99/monthly), you’re spending about 3.5 cents for both monochrome and color pages, which also applies when you print photos. For such a high quality print job, 3.5 cents a page is one killer deal.
HP Tango X Wrap Up
When you wield the HP Tango X, you get in return a printer with an awesome ink subscription that can be controlled by your voice. It handles documents well, but photos even better—provided you’re okay with borderless printing being limited to 5×7, and scanning/copying done by smart device. Its performance, we think, makes up for it.
