Printer error codes

An ink system failure, common on HP OfficeJet models. It often follows an issue with the printhead or ink cartridges rather than the main board. Removing and reseating the cartridges and printhead, cleaning the contacts, and doing a hard reset resolves a share of cases; a genuinely failed printhead needs replacement.

The printer cannot read the memory chip (the e-label) on a toner or ink supply. It often follows fitting a refilled, remanufactured, or third-party cartridge, or a supply whose chip is dirty or damaged. Cleaning the chip contacts or fitting a supply with a readable chip resolves it.

A paper jam reported at a specific point in the paper path. The number after the 13 indicates the location, so following the paper path from the tray through to the output and removing any caught paper clears it.

A firmware error, usually caused by a corrupt print job or a communication problem. Clearing the queue and power cycling the printer clears it in most cases; if it returns immediately, a firmware update is the next step.

A firmware error, the same family as the 49 service error, usually triggered by a corrupt print job or a driver problem rather than failed hardware. Clearing the queue, power cycling, and updating firmware resolves most cases.

A fuser error on a laser printer, often related to the power supply the printer is plugged into as well as the fuser unit itself. Because the fuser runs at high temperature and carries mains voltage, this is one to approach carefully.

A laser or beam-detect error inside the printer's optical assembly. It usually indicates a hardware fault rather than something adjustable, though a power cycle is worth trying first.

A main motor error. The printer's drive motor is not turning as expected, which points to a mechanical or component fault.

An error relating to the transfer belt or one of the printer's motors on a colour laser. It usually points to a mechanical or component fault rather than a settings problem.

A firmware-level error, most often triggered by a corrupt print job or an out-of-date firmware version rather than failed hardware. Turning the printer off, clearing the print queue, and updating the firmware resolves a large share of cases.

The printer cannot detect one or more ink cartridges even though they are fitted. It is usually caused by protective tape left on a new cartridge, dirty contacts, or a damaged chip, often on refilled or third-party cartridges. Removing the tape, cleaning the contacts, and reseating the cartridge clears most cases.

The HP Smart app cannot find your printer during setup or printing. The common causes are the phone and printer being on different Wi-Fi bands, Bluetooth or location permission being off during setup, or the printer not being in setup mode. Keeping both on the same 2.4GHz network with Bluetooth and location enabled lets the app find it.

HP Smart reports the printer offline even though it is switched on. This usually means the printer has dropped off Wi-Fi or its IP address has changed since the app last reached it. Power cycling the printer and reserving its IP address on the router keeps it online.

The print head is not installed or cannot be detected. It usually means the head is missing, not seated fully, or its contacts are dirty. Reseating the print head firmly and cleaning the contacts clears it in most cases.

The print head fitted is not the correct type for the printer, or the printer cannot recognise it. It often appears after fitting the wrong or a faulty print head. Reseating the correct print head, cleaning its contacts, and restarting the printer resolves most cases.

An ink tank is not installed, or is installed and cannot be detected. The printer stops until the tank it names is seated properly, and unlike the head faults it is almost always something you can put right in a couple of minutes. Start with the tank the message names. Take it out and put it back, pressing until it clicks; a tank that is nearly home but not quite is the single most common cause, and it looks perfectly seated from above. If it still is not seen, look at the small contacts on the tank and at the matching ones inside the carriage, and wipe both with a dry lint free cloth. Ink or dust across those contacts breaks the connection that tells the printer the tank is there. Two other things produce it. Some tanks ship with an orange protective cap or a strip of tape over the outlet or the contacts, and a new tank fitted with either still attached will not be recognised. And refilled or third party tanks carry chips the printer sometimes refuses to read, which presents as this code rather than as a compatibility warning; if every tank is genuine, seated and clean and one is still not seen, that tank is the fault rather than the printer.

An ink tank is empty or reporting empty. The printer stops to avoid printing without ink. Replacing or, where supported, resetting the reported tank clears it.

A warning that the waste ink absorber, which collects ink from cleaning cycles, is nearly full. Printing can usually continue for now, but the absorber will eventually need servicing and the counter resetting. It is the early warning before the printer stops with a full-absorber error.

A service error, pointing at either the scanning unit or the purge and cleaning mechanism that parks and caps the print head. Both live under the same fault number because both are driven by parts the printer cannot re-test on its own once they have jammed. A full power cycle is worth doing properly before anything else, and properly means switching off, unplugging from the wall rather than a switched strip, waiting a few minutes and starting again. It clears the latched state, and where the cause was a one off obstruction that has since freed itself, the printer comes back. Beyond that, there is a limit to what is sensible at home. Open the cover with the printer off and unplugged and look for anything obvious in the carriage path: packing material left from a move, a fragment of torn paper, a foreign object under the head. Remove what is clearly loose and nothing else. The purge unit and the scanner drive are not user serviceable, and a code that returns straight away after a genuine power cycle means one of them needs attention rather than persistence. On a machine still under warranty this is the point to stop and contact the manufacturer, because opening it further will end the cover.

A carriage error, usually caused by something physically blocking the print head as it moves. Common causes are leftover packing material, a paper jam near the carriage, or a dirty encoder strip.

A print head temperature or ink error. It appears most often when the printer has been asked to print while one colour is empty or unreadable, which is why it so frequently follows a low ink warning that was worked around rather than dealt with. The reason it is treated as serious rather than routine is what running dry does. A head that fires with no ink to carry the heat away gets hot quickly, so the printer stops and reports a temperature fault instead of letting the damage continue. That makes the first thing to check the ink levels, including the colours you were not printing with, because the head is cleaned with all of them regardless of what the document contained. Work through it in this order. Replace or refit any tank that is empty or that the printer will not acknowledge, making sure each clicks home and its contacts are clean. Power the printer off, unplug it for a few minutes and start it again, which clears the latched state. If the code returns with full tanks correctly seated, treat it as the head rather than the ink, and the same reasoning applies as for a B200: a fault that survives a clean reseat with cartridges the printer accepts is usually the head itself.

The waste ink absorber, which collects ink from cleaning cycles, is reported as full. This is a maintenance limit rather than a breakage. It requires the absorber pad to be serviced and the counter reset, which on many home models is close to the cost of the printer.

A paper feed error. The printer cannot feed paper correctly, usually because of a jam, an obstruction in the paper path, or a lifting plate that has not reset.

A paper delivery error. The printer cannot feed or eject paper correctly, usually because of a jam, an obstruction, or a delivery unit that is not seated properly.

A problem with the print head or the ink system. The printer stops rather than continue, because the fault it has detected is one that can damage the head permanently if printing carries on, usually overheating or a short across the head's contacts. The order things are worth trying in matters here. Switch the printer off and unplug it for a few minutes, since the code latches and a genuine power cycle clears the latch on its own more often than people expect. If it returns, open the cover, take the cartridges out, and lift the print head out of the carriage. Look at the gold contacts on the head and at the matching contacts in the carriage: dried ink, a smear, or a trace of moisture across them produces exactly this fault, and cleaning both sides with a dry lint free cloth and letting them dry completely is the repair in a large share of cases. Put the head back so it seats fully, then the cartridges, then power on. Refilled and third party cartridges are worth suspecting if you use them. Ink that runs at a different resistance, or a chip the printer cannot read, can present as a head fault rather than an ink fault. Fitting genuine cartridges, even briefly, is a quick way to establish which it is. The honest part: if it comes back immediately after a clean reseat with cartridges the printer accepts, the head itself has usually failed. Replacement heads are sold separately and can be fitted at home, but on most consumer models the head costs enough that it is worth comparing against the price of the printer before ordering one.

The Canon PRINT app cannot reach your printer over the network. The usual cause is the phone and printer being on different Wi-Fi networks or bands, or the printer being offline. Connecting both to the same 2.4GHz network and confirming the printer is on Wi-Fi resolves it.

A hardware error often associated with the scanner unit on an all-in-one. It can sometimes be cleared with a power cycle, but a persistent 0x69 usually indicates a component fault.

An internal hardware error, most commonly a failure on the printer's mainboard. There is little a user can safely do beyond a full power cycle, and on many models this fault effectively ends the printer's life.

A carriage error. Something is stopping the ink cartridge holder from moving freely, such as a jam, a stray piece of packaging, or a cable snagging the carriage.

An internal error that often appears during setup or after a jam, frequently caused by leftover packing material or an obstruction around the ink carriage. Checking for anything blocking the carriage and removing all shipping locks is the first thing to try.

A general fault, and the message is deliberately vague because the printer has stopped without being able to name what stopped it. It asks you to switch it off and on, and that instruction is worth following properly rather than dismissing: the code latches, and a genuine power cycle is what clears the latch. Properly means switching off at the printer's own button, unplugging from the wall rather than a switched extension, waiting a couple of minutes, then plugging in and starting again. A printer that comes back and prints was reporting a condition that has already passed, and nothing further is needed. When it returns immediately, something physical is usually in the way. A paper jam is the most common, including fragments left behind after a jam that was cleared: a strip of paper still wrapped around a roller reads as an obstruction even though the sheet came out. With the printer off and unplugged, open the covers it is designed to open, look along the path the paper takes, and remove anything loose. Check the carriage can slide freely from side to side, and look for packing material if the printer is new or has recently been moved, since the transport lock and the tape are a frequent cause on a first setup. If the carriage will not move by hand, or nothing is visibly in the way and the code returns after every power cycle, it is a mechanical fault rather than an obstruction. That is the point to stop, because the parts involved are not user serviceable and forcing the carriage causes the damage the code exists to prevent. On a machine under warranty, contact Epson rather than going further.

A pad inside the printer that soaks up waste ink from cleaning cycles has reached the end of its rated life. This is a maintenance limit, not a breakage. It needs the pad serviced and the counter reset, which on many home models costs close to a new printer.

The Epson Smart Panel or iPrint app cannot find your printer on the network. This is normally a network mismatch, the printer being asleep, or the printer not yet joined to Wi-Fi. Putting the phone and printer on the same 2.4GHz network and waking the printer lets the app see it.

"Cannot communicate with the scanner" on an Epson all-in-one. It usually means the scanner driver or connection is the problem rather than the scanner hardware. Checking the USB or network connection, restarting the printer, and reinstalling the scanner software resolves most cases.

The ink absorber, or purge pad, that collects waste ink from cleaning is full. This is a maintenance limit. It needs the absorber serviced and the counter reset, which usually means an authorised service centre.

A mechanical error. Something is jammed or obstructed in the print mechanism, stopping a part from moving as it should. Checking for jams and foreign objects, then power cycling, clears many cases.

The Brother iPrint&Scan or Mobile Connect app cannot find your printer. The common causes are the phone and printer being on different Wi-Fi networks or bands, or the printer being offline. Connecting both to the same 2.4GHz network resolves most cases.

The drum unit is near the end of its life. It is separate from the toner cartridge on Brother machines, which is why replacing toner does not clear it. Expect faint print and repeating marks down the page as it wears, and order a drum before quality drops.

The drum unit has reached the end of its rated life. The printer keeps working for a while, with quality falling off, until it stops. After fitting a new drum the counter has to be reset from the panel, which is the step most people miss.

The printer could not connect to your wireless network. Usually the network was not found, the signal is too weak, or the password was wrong. It is a connection problem, not a hardware fault.

The printer found the network but could not join it because the wireless security type does not match. This often happens with newer routers using WPA3, where switching the router to WPA2 or a mixed mode resolves it.

An original has jammed in the automatic document feeder during a scan or copy. Only the feeder is affected, so printing from a computer still works. Lift the feeder cover, remove the original, and check for staples or curled corners before reloading.

A fault in the fusing unit, the heated assembly that bonds toner to the page. A full power off, wait, and power on clears it when the cause was a one off. A code that comes straight back normally means the fuser has reached the end of its life and needs replacing.

The machine received a job it could not interpret. It is almost always a driver problem rather than a fault: the wrong print driver for the model, or a job sent in a page description language this machine does not support. The printer itself is usually fine, and the same document prints once the right driver is used.

Paper has stopped in the paper path and the sensors can still see it. The code stays on until every sheet is out, including small torn pieces, so open each door the panel points at and check the rollers rather than only pulling the visible sheet.

A toner cartridge has been fitted that the machine does not accept, or a correct cartridge is not seated far enough for its chip to be read. Check the part number against the model, then remove and refit the cartridge until it clicks home.

The fuser is not reaching or holding its working temperature. Switching the printer off at the wall for a couple of minutes sometimes clears a one off. If the code returns, the fuser is the part at fault and needs replacing rather than resetting.

Paper has jammed on its way out of the input tray. The two digits after the 200 narrow down where the sheet stopped, which is why the panel usually names a door to open. Pull jammed paper in the direction it was travelling to avoid leaving pieces behind.

The printer cannot read the cartridge that is fitted, or none is fitted at all. Take the cartridge out, check that every piece of orange packaging and tape has been removed, then refit it firmly. A cartridge that still will not read after that is usually the problem.

The imaging or photoconductor unit is near the end of its rated life. It is worth acting on because the symptoms show up on the page first: faint bands, repeating marks at regular intervals down the sheet, and a grey background across areas that should be white.

The toner cartridge is running low. This is a warning rather than a stop: printing continues, with print gradually going lighter as the toner runs out. Shaking the cartridge gently side to side usually buys a few more pages.

The printer's internal software has stopped. Despite the word service, it is most often triggered by a corrupt print job or firmware that is behind, not by failed hardware. Power the printer off, clear the print queue on the computer, then power it back on before sending anything else.

The fusing unit did not reach its working temperature within the time the machine allows. On many Ricoh models the code can be cleared from the service menu, and it stays away if the cause was a cold start or a brief power problem. A code that keeps coming back points at the fuser or its thermistor.

The fusing unit read a temperature above its safe range, so the machine stopped itself. This is a protective stop rather than damage in itself. Because it involves a heating element, a code that repeats after a reset is one to hand to a technician rather than keep clearing.

The controller board and the engine board did not establish communication during start up, so the machine never becomes ready. A full power cycle at the wall is the first thing to try. If it persists the machine needs attention on site.

The controller rejected a job it could not process. It behaves like a software fault rather than a hardware one: clearing the print queue and restarting both the machine and the spooler on the computer usually resolves it, and updating the driver stops it returning.

The polygon motor inside the laser scanning unit is not reaching its working speed. This is internal hardware, not something a user setting affects, so beyond one power cycle it needs a service call.

The fusing unit is not heating as expected and the printer has stopped to protect itself. Switching off at the wall for several minutes occasionally clears a one off. A code that returns means the fuser needs inspecting or replacing, which is a job for a technician on most models.

The waste toner container is full or is not fitted. It is one of the easier codes to deal with: fit a new container, or refit the existing one properly, and the printer carries on. Do not empty and reuse the container, since the sensor and the seal are part of it.

The control panel and the main board have stopped communicating, which usually leaves the screen blank or frozen. Power the machine off at the wall, wait a full minute, then power it on. If the panel is still unresponsive the machine needs a technician.

Paper has stopped inside the printer. Open the rear cover as well as the front, since a sheet that has reached the fuser is easier to remove from the back, and pull it in the direction it was already travelling to avoid tearing.

The printer cannot detect a cartridge. On a new machine this is usually the protective packaging still in place, or the cartridge pushed in but not clicked home. Remove it, pull off any tape and seals, and refit it until it seats with a click.

The printer is not joined to a wireless network. The most common reason is a 5GHz network: most Pantum wireless printers only join 2.4GHz. Check which band the phone or laptop is on before assuming the password is wrong.

The printer cannot detect the fuser. Most of the time it is fitted but not locked down, which happens easily after clearing a jam. Open the top cover, check that both fuser levers are in the locked position, and close everything firmly.

A sheet has jammed inside the printer and the sensors still detect it. Remove the image drums carefully if the panel asks you to, take out the sheet in the direction of travel, and check that no torn corner has stayed behind on the belt.

A toner cartridge is missing, not seated, or not the type this printer expects. The number after the code identifies the colour. Refit the cartridge until it clicks and check the part number against the model before assuming it has failed.

"The system cannot find the file specified", seen when adding a printer or when a print job fails. Windows went looking for part of the driver and it was not where the installation said it would be. An interrupted or partial driver installation is the usual history. The package registered itself, the copy did not finish, and Windows has been referring to a file that never arrived. Reinstalling over the top rarely fixes it, because the broken registration is still there and the installer treats the driver as already present. Remove it properly first. Stop the Print Spooler service from services.msc, then open printmanagement.msc, go to Custom Filters and All Drivers, and delete every entry for that printer. Start the spooler again, then install the manufacturer's current driver from their support page. The stopped spooler is what allows the deletion; with it running, Windows reports the driver as in use and the removal appears to do nothing. On a shared printer the same message can mean the driver is missing on the computer doing the sharing rather than on yours. If printing works from that machine and fails from yours, install the driver locally and connect by local port: Add printer, the printer I want is not listed, Add a local printer, Create a new port, Local Port, and enter \\COMPUTERNAME\PrinterShareName.

"The handle is invalid", seen when printing or when connecting to a printer. Windows was holding a reference to the printer that is no longer valid, which happens when the print spooler has stopped or when the entry describing the printer has been damaged. Start with the service, because it accounts for most of these. Open services.msc, find Print Spooler, and restart it. Check its Startup Type is set to Automatic while you are there; a spooler set to Manual will be stopped again after the next restart and the error will return looking like a new fault. If restarting the service does not clear it, the printer entry itself is stale. Remove the printer from Settings, Bluetooth and devices, Printers and scanners, restart the computer, and add it again. Restarting between the two matters here: Windows holds parts of a removed printer until it does, and adding it straight back can restore the same broken entry. On a shared printer, this can also mean the computer sharing it has gone to sleep or changed address since your machine last spoke to it. Check that machine is awake and reachable before rebuilding anything on yours. Where it keeps returning after all of that, the driver is usually taking the spooler down with it, and removing the driver package rather than the printer is the repair. The spooler has to be stopped before a driver package will delete.

"The data is invalid", seen while adding a printer or installing its driver. Windows received a driver package it could not make sense of, so the fault is in what was supplied rather than in the printer. A damaged or partial download is the simplest cause and the first thing to rule out: download the driver again from the manufacturer, from their support page rather than from a link in a search result, and run it fresh. The more common cause is an old driver already in place that the new one cannot install over. Removing it properly is the fix, and properly means the spooler has to be stopped first or Windows will report the driver as in use. Open services.msc and stop Print Spooler. Then open printmanagement.msc, go to Custom Filters and All Drivers, and delete every entry belonging to that printer. Start the spooler again and install the manufacturer's driver. Architecture is worth a glance if the printer is old. A 32 bit driver will not install on 64 bit Windows, and the message you get is this one rather than anything about architecture. The manufacturer's page lists them separately; the 64 bit build is the one almost every current machine needs. If no driver exists for your version of Windows at all, adding the printer as an IPP device lets Windows drive it with the class driver built into the system, which handles printing on nearly every printer made in the last decade.

"The parameter is incorrect", seen when connecting to a printer shared from another computer. It belongs to the same family as 0x0000011b and 0x0000007c: the printer is fine, printing from the machine it is attached to is fine, and only the connection across the network refuses. What has usually happened is that the two computers no longer agree on how the driver should be handed over. A security update to one of them changed what the other is permitted to accept, so a setup that worked for months stops on a morning when nobody changed anything. The advice to uninstall the update solves it for a few days and then the update returns, along with the problem, minus a security fix you wanted. The durable route is to stop asking the other computer for the driver. Install the printer driver on your own machine from the manufacturer's download, then add the printer as a local one pointed at the share: Add printer, the printer I want is not listed, Add a local printer or network printer with manual settings, Create a new port, Local Port, and type \\COMPUTERNAME\PrinterShareName as the port name. Choose the driver you just installed when asked. The job still goes to the same printer over the same network. The difference is that nothing has to be negotiated between two Windows installations that have stopped agreeing.

"The data area passed to a system call is too small", seen when connecting to a shared printer. Despite the wording, this is not about the size of anything you sent. It is another of the shared printer connection failures, alongside 0x0000011b, 0x0000057 and 0x0000007c, and the cause and the cure are the same. The two computers disagree about how the driver is delivered, usually because an update landed on one side and not the other. Nothing on the printer changed and nothing you did caused it. Install the driver locally, then connect by local port rather than by browsing to the share. Get the driver from the manufacturer's support page and install it on your machine. Then Add printer, the printer I want is not listed, Add a local printer or network printer with manual settings, Create a new port, choose Local Port, and enter the share path as the port name, in the form \\COMPUTERNAME\PrinterShareName. Select your installed driver when prompted. It is worth checking one simpler thing first, because it produces the same code and takes a moment: the computer sharing the printer has to be awake and on the network. A machine that has gone to sleep gives an error about the connection rather than about being asleep, and no amount of reconfiguring your side will help while it is.

A shared printer connection failure that appeared alongside the Windows updates of recent years, in the same family as 0x0000011b. The printer works, and printing from the computer it is attached to works. Only the connection from another machine over the network fails. The cause is a mismatch between the two computers rather than a fault on either. The machine sharing the printer and the machine connecting to it have to agree on how the driver is delivered, and a security update to one side changed what the other side is allowed to accept. Which is why it appears overnight on a setup nobody touched. Uninstalling the update is the advice that circulates and it is the wrong answer: it works for a few days until the update reinstalls, and it removes a security fix you wanted. The route that holds is to stop asking the sharing computer for the driver at all. Install the printer driver on your own machine first, from the manufacturer's download rather than from the network. Then add the printer as a local printer pointed at the shared one: Add printer, then the printer I want is not listed, then Add a local printer or network printer with manual settings, Create a new port, choose Local Port, and enter \\COMPUTERNAME\PrinterShareName as the port name. Pick your installed driver when asked. The job goes to the same printer over the same network; what changes is that nothing has to be negotiated between the two Windows installations.

This appears when connecting to a shared or network printer, almost always after a Windows security update that hardened the print spooler. It is a Windows-side problem, not a fault with the printer. It is usually resolved by adjusting a registry value or installing the printer by IP address instead of through the shared connection.

"The user name or password is incorrect", seen when connecting to a printer shared from another computer. Nothing is wrong with the printer. Windows is being refused entry to the machine that shares it. The usual cause is a stored credential that has gone stale. Windows remembers the sign-in it used for that computer, and when the password there changes, or the account is removed, it keeps presenting the old one and never asks you for a new one. Clearing the stored entry is what forces it to ask again: open Credential Manager from the Start menu, choose Windows Credentials, find the entry for the computer sharing the printer, and remove it. Reconnect and Windows will prompt properly. When you are prompted, the form of the user name matters. Type the name of the sharing computer, a backslash, then the account name on that computer, like OFFICE-PC\\john. A bare user name is looked up on your own machine, which is why the correct password still fails. Two other cases produce it. If the sharing computer has an account with no password at all, Windows will refuse the connection regardless of what you type, and the fix is to set a password on that account. And if the printer is on a work domain you are not signed in to, no local credential will satisfy it. If none of that applies, connect by local port instead, which skips the credential exchange entirely: Add printer, then the printer I want is not listed, then Add a local printer, Create a new port, Local Port, and enter \\COMPUTERNAME\PrinterShareName as the port name.

"The RPC server is unavailable", seen when connecting to a shared printer or when opening printer properties. RPC is how one Windows machine asks another to do something, and the message means the request went out and nothing answered. The most frequent cause is the plainest one: the print spooler on the computer sharing the printer is not running. Check that machine first, at services.msc, and start Print Spooler if it has stopped. Set its Startup Type to Automatic while you are there, because a spooler left on Manual will be stopped again after the next restart and the error will come back looking new. The same message appears when the sharing computer is asleep, has been given a different address by the router, or has been renamed. Any of the three leaves your machine calling an address where nobody is listening. Confirming you can reach it at all, by opening \\COMPUTERNAME in File Explorer, separates a network problem from a printer one in a few seconds. On your own machine, the spooler matters too: RPC calls for printing go through it, and a stopped spooler locally produces the same wording. Restart it before assuming the fault is at the other end. Where the two computers can see each other and both spoolers are running, a firewall is usually blocking file and printer sharing on the machine that shares the printer, which is a setting on that machine rather than on yours.

"Operation could not be completed." It shows up when setting a default printer or connecting to a shared printer, and is usually caused by a default-printer registry setting or a stale printer entry rather than the printer itself.

"No printers were found." Windows searched and came back empty, which is a discovery result rather than an error about any particular printer. Discovery is the thing to suspect first. Windows only looks for printers on networks it considers private, so a connection marked Public hides everything on it by design. Check under Settings, Network and internet, your connection, and set the network profile to Private. While you are there, Network discovery has to be on, which lives under Advanced network settings and Advanced sharing settings. The next most common cause is that the printer is genuinely not on your network. A phone hotspot, a guest network, or a second band that the router keeps separate will all put the printer somewhere your computer cannot see, and the printer will still report itself as connected. Printing a network configuration page from the printer and comparing its address to your computer's settles it: the first three groups of numbers should match. When the printer is on the right network and still is not found, skip discovery. Add printer, then the printer I want is not listed, then Add a printer using a TCP/IP address or hostname, and enter the address from that configuration page. This works whenever discovery does not, and it is more reliable afterwards because it does not depend on the printer answering a broadcast. A stopped print spooler produces the same message with none of the above being wrong, so if the address is right and the network is right, restart the Print Spooler service before going further.

A driver installation failure, usually while Windows Update is trying to fetch a printer driver for you. The package either did not arrive intact or is not one this version of Windows will accept. The quickest resolution is to stop waiting for Windows Update and install the driver yourself from the manufacturer's support page, searched by the exact model number printed on the machine. A driver installed directly bypasses whatever failed in the update channel. Where the manufacturer offers nothing for your version of Windows, that absence is often deliberate rather than an oversight. Windows has been moving to a class driver of its own that talks to printers over IPP, and printers from roughly the last decade are meant to be driven by it rather than by a download. Add the printer as an IPP device and it will normally print without any manufacturer software at all: Add printer, the printer I want is not listed, Add a printer using a TCP/IP address or hostname, set the device type to IPP Device, and enter the printer's address. Scanning generally still needs the manufacturer's app, installed separately. If a driver did partially install before failing, clear it out before trying again. Stop the Print Spooler service, remove the printer's entries from Print Management under All Drivers, then start the spooler and install fresh. A half installed package is a common reason the second attempt fails the same way as the first.

Google Cloud Print was permanently discontinued by Google at the end of 2020 and no longer works. If a printer or app still points to it, the fix is to switch to native mobile printing instead: AirPrint on iPhone and iPad, or the Mopria print service and your printer maker's app on Android.

Your iPhone or iPad cannot see an AirPrint printer to print to. Almost always the phone and the printer are on different Wi-Fi networks, or on the same router but different bands with client isolation on, or the printer is asleep. It is a discovery problem, not a fault with the printer. Putting both devices on the same 2.4GHz network and waking the printer resolves most cases.

Android's default print service, Mopria, cannot find a printer to print to. Usually the phone and printer are on different networks, the printer is asleep, or the right print service plugin for that brand is not installed. Installing the manufacturer's print plugin and joining the same Wi-Fi network resolves it.

The Android print service found the printer but is not getting an answer from it. This points to a weak Wi-Fi signal, the printer sleeping, or a changed IP address, rather than a hardware fault. Waking the printer and reconnecting both devices to the same network clears it.

The iPhone or iPad found the printer but the connection dropped part way through. This usually follows a weak Wi-Fi signal, the printer going to sleep, or the printer's IP address changing since it was added. Reconnecting both to the same network and reserving the printer's IP address on the router settles it.