Epson EcoTank ET-3850
Epson lists the ET-3850 as discontinued and names the EcoTank ET-3950 as its replacement. Its page stays up for comparison; the figures are the maker’s published ones for this model.
Where the two-digit EcoTanks are household printers with an office feature bolted on, the ET-3850 is built the other way round. It has a real 250-sheet enclosed cassette instead of a rear feed, Ethernet as well as Wi-Fi, a 2.4-inch touchscreen, and a print engine rated 15.5 ISO pages a minute in black — half again faster than the ET-2850 for a hundred dollars more. The ink is the same 502 set, so the running cost does not change: a third of a cent a mono page, a little over a cent for a page using all four inks. A 30-sheet document feeder sits on the lid as well, so the only hardware the ET-4850 above it adds is a fax modem. If you never fax, the ET-3850 is the better value of the two.
- Approx. price
- ~$399
- Cost per mono page
- 0.33¢
- Print speed, mono
- 15.5 ISO ppm
Daily printing, from a machine that keeps its paper in a cassette instead of fanned out of a rear tray.
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
- Epson 502 black bottle · 7,500 ISO pages · ~$24.99
- Colour consumable
- Epson 502 colour bottles · 6,000 ISO pages · ~$16.99 each
- Cost per mono page
- 0.33¢
- Cost per colour page
- 1.2¢
- Cost to own, 5,000 pages
- ~$424
- Cost to own, 200 pages/month for 3 years
- ~$435 (7,200 pages)
Computed from the consumable's ISO page yield and its list price. An estimate. How this is worked out
- Epson EcoTank ET-3850 (discontinued)~$424~$399 printer + ~$25 supplies
- Epson EcoTank ET-2850~$324~$299 printer + ~$25 supplies
- Epson EcoTank ET-4800~$326~$299 printer + ~$27 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
- ~$399
- Cost per mono page
- 0.33¢
- Cost to own, 3 years
- ~$435
- Technology
- Piezo inkjet
- Ink system
- Bottles
- Inks
- 4
- Black consumable
- Epson 502 black bottle · 7,500 pages
- Colour consumable
- Epson 502 colour bottles · 6,000 pages
- Ink in the box
- 7,500 pages
- Ink subscription
- None offered
- Print speed, mono
- 15.5 ISO ppm
- Print speed, colour
- 8.5 ISO ppm
- Functions
- Print · Copy · Scan
- Document feeder
- 30 sheets
- Paper capacity
- 250 sheets
- Max paper size
- Legal
- Resolution
- 4800 × 1200 dpi
- Connectivity
- Wi-Fi · Ethernet
- Mobile printing
- AirPrint · Mopria
- Display
- 2.4" colour touchscreen
- Dimensions
- 14.8 × 13.7 × 9.1 in
- Weight
- 14.8 lb
- Released
- 2021
Features
- 250-sheet front-loading enclosed paper cassette
- 30-sheet automatic document feeder
- Automatic two-sided printing
- 10/100 wired Ethernet alongside 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi
- 2.4-inch colour touchscreen
- Borderless photo printing to 8×10
- Four refillable tanks on the 502 ink set
In its favour
- An enclosed cassette keeps 250 sheets flat and dust-free, which the rear-feed models cannot do
- 15.5 ISO ppm black makes a long document bearable
- Wired Ethernet, which most printers at this price dropped years ago
- Same third-of-a-cent mono page as the cheaper 502-based models
- Touchscreen is responsive enough to drive copies without a phone
Against it
- The feeder scans one side only, so a two-sided original goes through twice
- No fax, which is the one thing the ET-4850 adds
- Taller than the two-digit models, with the cassette below and the feeder on the lid
- Photo output is good for a four-ink printer but not close to the six-ink ET-8500
What owners say
No owner discussion has been collected for the Epson EcoTank ET-3850 yet. The specifications above are the manufacturer’s published figures and the cost per page is computed from them — but nothing on this page claims to know what living with it is like, because nobody here has read owners on it.
Compare the ET-3850
Related printers
Epson EcoTank ET-2850
- Mono page
- 0.33¢
- Colour page
- 1.2¢
Epson EcoTank ET-4800
- Mono page
- 0.40¢
- Colour page
- 1.1¢
Epson EcoTank ET-4850
- Mono page
- 0.33¢
- Colour page
- 1.2¢