There are three different ways to get a printer onto your Wi-Fi network, and which one works best depends on what your printer has — a screen, a WPS button, or neither. Here's all three, plus the one setting that causes most connection failures.
Have your Wi-Fi network name (SSID) and password ready — written down or visible on your phone, since you'll often need to type it directly on the printer's small keypad or touchscreen. Make sure the printer is powered on and has finished its initial calibration cycle before attempting to connect. If your router broadcasts two networks (many do), you'll want the 2.4GHz one specifically — more on why below.
Almost every printer with a screen or button panel has a wireless setup wizard built in, usually reached through a settings, network, or Wi-Fi icon on its display. The flow is generally:
This method is the most reliable because you're explicitly telling the printer which network to join, which avoids the most common failure mode below.
If your router has a WPS button (often labeled "WPS" with a small icon of two arrows), some printers support a faster pairing method: press the WPS button on your router, then within about two minutes, press the wireless or WPS button on the printer. The two devices handshake automatically without you typing a password at all.
The catch: not all printers support WPS, some newer routers have WPS disabled by default for security reasons, and this method occasionally fails to specify which of a router's two bands (2.4GHz/5GHz) to use — if your printer connects but then can't be found, that's usually why.
For compact printers with no screen at all, the setup almost always happens through the manufacturer's own app (HP Smart, Canon PRINT, Epson Smart Panel, and equivalents from other brands). You'll typically connect your phone temporarily to a direct signal the printer broadcasts during setup, then the app hands your home Wi-Fi credentials to the printer automatically. This is usually the smoothest method for screenless printers, since there's no keypad to fumble through.
Most home routers broadcast two separate Wi-Fi networks from the same box — a 2.4GHz one (longer range, slower) and a 5GHz one (shorter range, faster). Many printers, especially anything more than a few years old, can only join the 2.4GHz network, even though your phone and laptop happily connect to either. If your router shows one combined network name for both bands, this usually isn't an issue. But if you see two separate names (sometimes with "-5G" or similar in one of them), make sure you're selecting the plain one on the printer, not the 5G-labeled one.
Print a test page from your computer's printer settings, not from the printer's own menu — the printer's built-in test only confirms the printer itself works, not that your computer can actually reach it over the network. If that test print succeeds, the wireless connection is genuinely working end to end.
Beyond the 2.4GHz/5GHz mismatch above, the next most common causes are the printer joining a guest network by mistake, the router repeatedly switching devices between bands ("band steering"), or the printer simply being too far from the router during setup. We've got a full breakdown of these in our common wireless printer errors section, with the specific fix for each.
Search your printer's model number for the right driver link, or see the full six-step setup checklist.
Search by model numberThe most common reasons, in order of likelihood.
Read the article →Why each step matters and the mistakes that cause most first-time setup failures.
Read the article →The specific sequence that resolves most failed installations.
Read the article →