Print & Photocopy Cost Calculator
Compare printing at home against a print shop, including cartridge and paper cost.
Home printing feels free once you own a printer, and print shops feel expensive at ₹2 a page. Neither impression survives the arithmetic. This calculator counts ink, paper, depreciation and electricity on one side, and the shop rate plus binding and travel on the other.
What you are printing
Result
Fill in the fields above and your result will appear here.
What the Print & Photocopy Cost Calculator does
The dominant cost of home printing is ink, not the printer. A ₹1,600 cartridge rated for 1,500 pages costs about ₹1.07 a page before paper — and rated yields are measured at 5% page coverage, which a normal text document exceeds.
Print shops win on small jobs because their fixed costs are already covered. Home printing wins on volume, provided the printer is used enough to justify owning it.
How to use this tool
- Enter the number of pages and copies, and whether you are printing double-sided.
- Enter your cartridge price and its rated page yield. Real-world yield is often 20–30% lower.
- Enter paper price per ream of 500 sheets.
- Add printer price and expected life to include depreciation — a ₹12,000 printer over 30,000 pages is ₹0.40 a page.
- Enter the shop rate along with binding and the cost of travelling there, which is a real cost of the alternative.
Formula and method
Sheets needed = Pages ÷ 2 if double-sided, else Pages
Ink per page = Cartridge price ÷ Rated yield
Paper per sheet = Ream price ÷ 500
Depreciation = Printer price ÷ Expected life in pages
Home total = Ink + Paper + Depreciation + Electricity
Shop total = Rate × Pages + Binding + Travel
Break-even pages = Shop fixed costs ÷ (Shop rate − Home marginal cost)
Worked example
Example: 200 pages, black and white, double-sided
| Ink at ₹1.07 per page | ₹213 |
| Paper — 100 sheets at ₹0.64 | ₹64 |
| Depreciation at ₹0.40 per page | ₹80 |
| Electricity | ₹10 |
| Home total | ₹367 — ₹1.84 per page |
| Shop at ₹2 plus ₹40 binding and ₹40 travel | ₹480 — ₹2.40 per page |
Home printing wins by ₹113 here. At 40 pages instead of 200, the shop would win — the fixed costs of travel and binding are spread over too few pages at home to matter.
What your result means
Cost per page is the comparable figure. Anything under ₹1 for black and white at home is good; above ₹2 suggests an expensive cartridge or a low yield.
The break-even volume tells you when to walk to the shop and when to print at home. For most jobs it lands somewhere between 30 and 80 pages.
Ink as a share of cost is usually 50–70%. That is why an inexpensive printer with expensive cartridges is generally a worse buy than the reverse.
Important considerations
- Rated cartridge yields are measured at 5% page coverage on a standard test page. Dense text, tables or images can halve the real yield.
- Ink tank printers have a much lower cost per page than cartridge models and pay back over a few thousand pages, though they cost more upfront.
- Inkjet cartridges dry out if unused for long periods. If you print rarely, a shop is usually cheaper than replacing dried cartridges.
- Laser printers are far cheaper per page for black and white text and are worth considering above a few thousand pages a year.
- Print shops often negotiate on volume. For a thesis or a large batch, ask — the listed rate is rarely the best available.
- Draft or eco mode reduces ink consumption substantially for internal documents where quality does not matter.
Limitations of this tool
- Real-world cartridge yield varies enormously with page content and cannot be predicted precisely from the rated figure.
- It does not model printer failures, maintenance kits or the drum replacement laser printers eventually need.
- Print shop rates vary by city, volume and paper quality, and colour rates in particular differ widely.
Frequently asked questions
Is it cheaper to print at home or at a shop?
For large jobs, usually at home once you own the printer. For small jobs, the shop wins because travel and binding are fixed costs spread over few pages. The break-even is typically 30–80 pages.
What is the real cost per page of home printing?
Typically ₹1.50–₹2.50 for black and white on a cartridge inkjet including paper and depreciation, and ₹6–₹12 for colour. Ink tank and laser printers are considerably cheaper per page.
Why is my cartridge finishing faster than the rated pages?
Rated yields assume 5% page coverage on a standard test page. Dense text, tables, borders or images can use two to three times as much ink per page.
Is an ink tank printer worth it?
If you print more than a few thousand pages a year, usually yes. The cost per page is a fraction of a cartridge model, and the higher purchase price is recovered over a few thousand pages.