Canon

Canon PIXMA G3270

Ink tankBottles

Canon's answer to the entry EcoTank, and the closest competitor the ET-2800 has. The MegaTank body puts four visible reservoirs along the front so you can see how much ink is left without asking the software, and the GI-21 bottles refill them for about four tenths of a cent a black page — within a rounding error of Epson's. Canon's pitch over Epson is the pigment black: text comes out noticeably crisper and does not feather on cheap paper, where Epson's entry EcoTanks use a dye black. What you give up is the same list as on the ET-2800 — no automatic duplex, no feeder, a monochrome LCD, and a rear-only 100-sheet feed. At eleven ISO pages a minute it is marginally quicker than the Epson, which will not change anyone's day.

Approx. price: ~$249
Cost per mono page: 0.38¢
Cost per colour page: 1.3¢
Cost to own, 5,000 pages: ~$277
Print speed, mono: 11 ISO ppm

Best for

A household choosing between entry tank printers that cares more about crisp text than about a document feeder.

marks an estimate. Computed from the consumable's ISO page yield and its list price. An estimate. Purchase price plus ink or toner over the pages shown, assuming four mono pages for every colour page. Price is an approximate snapshot from our last catalogue update.

What it costs to own

Black consumable: Canon GI-21 pigment black bottle · 6,000 ISO pages · ~$22.99
Colour consumable: Canon GI-21 colour bottles · 7,700 ISO pages · ~$23.00 each
Cost per mono page: 0.38¢
Cost per colour page: 1.3¢
Cost to own, 5,000 pages: ~$277
Cost to own, 200 pages/month for 3 years: ~$289 (7,200 pages)

Computed from the consumable's ISO page yield and its list price. An estimate. How this is worked out

Cost to own · 5,000 pages

Canon PIXMA G3270~$277
~$249 printer + ~$28 supplies
Canon PIXMA G4270~$327
~$299 printer + ~$28 supplies
Canon PIXMA G6020~$404
~$379 printer + ~$25 supplies

purchase priceink or toner. An estimate: purchase price plus 5,000 pages at each printer’s computed cost per page, assuming 4 mono pages for every colour page. Printers whose consumable price we could not source are left out.

Specifications

Manufacturer-published figures. Cost lines are computed from the consumable figures above and are estimates.

Approx. price: ~$249
Cost per mono page: 0.38¢
Cost per colour page: 1.3¢
Cost to own, 5,000 pages: ~$277
Cost to own, 3 years: ~$289
Technology: Thermal inkjet
Ink system: Bottles
Inks: 4
Black consumable: Canon GI-21 pigment black bottle · 6,000 pages
Colour consumable: Canon GI-21 colour bottles · 7,700 pages
Ink in the box: 6,000 pages
Third-party ink lock: No
Ink subscription: None offered
Print speed, mono: 11 ISO ppm
Print speed, colour: 6 ISO ppm
Functions: Print · Copy · Scan
Two-sided printing: Manual
Document feeder: None
Paper capacity: 100 sheets
Max paper size: Legal
Borderless photo: Yes
Resolution: 4800 × 1200 dpi
Connectivity: Wi-Fi
Mobile printing: AirPrint · Mopria
Display: Mono LCD
Dimensions: 16.3 × 13.1 × 6.5 in
Weight: 13.4 lb
Released: 2023

Features

Four front-facing tanks with visible ink levels
Pigment black ink for sharp text on plain paper
Borderless photo printing to 8.5 × 11
Flatbed scanner and standalone copier
Refills from keyed GI-21 bottles
Prints from a phone over AirPrint or Mopria

No ink lock Borderless photo

In its favour

Pigment black gives noticeably sharper text than the dye blacks in Epson's entry EcoTanks
About 0.38¢ a mono page, the cheapest black page of any Canon here
Ink levels are visible through the tank windows, not guessed from a driver
Slightly faster than the comparable Epson at 11 ipm
No firmware check on refill bottles

Against it

No automatic two-sided printing
No document feeder — every scan is a single sheet on the glass
Monochrome LCD makes standalone copy settings awkward
Rear paper feed only, and the stack sits exposed

What owners say

Distilled from owner discussions and long-term published reviews

Canon's MegaTank line is the alternative people consider when they have decided against an EcoTank, and the G3270 is the direct rival to the ET-2800. Owners who compared them in person tend to point at text quality: Canon uses a pigment black where Epson's entry models use dye, and on ordinary copy paper the difference is visible.

The complaints are the tank-inkjet standards plus one specific to Canon. Bleeding on matte photo paper comes up repeatedly — prints that start out clean and then, on a heavier job, spread at the edges. The advice that recurs is to drop the saturation, match the paper setting exactly, and give prints time before stacking. Like every printer of this type, it dislikes sitting idle for weeks.

What owners like

Owners comparing it directly against an entry EcoTank prefer its text: the pigment black is sharper and does not feather on cheap copy paper
Tank windows on the front mean ink level is something you look at rather than trust a driver about
Refill bottles are inexpensive and there is no firmware check on them
Owners printing school and craft material in quantity report the running cost living up to the promise

Common complaints

Owners printing on matte photo paper report ink bleeding and prints coming out soft, particularly at high saturation
The same idle-clogging behaviour as every tank inkjet — it wants to be used
No automatic duplex at a price where Epson's ET-2850 has one
The monochrome LCD makes standalone copying more awkward than it needs to be

Questions that keep coming up

Canon MegaTank or Epson EcoTank?

They are close enough that either is a reasonable choice. Canon's pigment black gives sharper text on plain paper; Epson's entry models are marginally cheaper per page and the ET-2850 adds automatic duplex at the same price point. Owners who print mostly documents lean Canon; owners who want duplex without paying more lean Epson.

Why are my prints bleeding on photo paper?

Owners report this with heavy ink coverage on matte photo stock. The usual causes are a paper setting that does not match the actual paper, saturation set too high, or stacking prints before they are dry. It is a dye-ink-on-coated-paper problem rather than a fault, and it is worse on cheaper third-party paper.

Does it print on both sides?

Not automatically — you flip the stack yourself. At this price Epson's ET-2850 does have an automatic duplexer, which is the main reason someone might choose it over this. Canon's G6020 and G7020 add duplex further up the MegaTank range.

Computed from the consumable's ISO page yield and its list price. An estimate. Owner notes are a summary of what people who own the machine report, not a test result — there is no lab behind this site.