HP DeskJet 4255e

Inkjet all-in-oneTricolor cartridgeThird-party ink lockHP Instant Ink

Enrolling this printer at setup commits it to the manufacturer’s own ink or toner for the life of the machine, enforced in firmware. Source: HP's own HP+ programme page, which lists “Original HP Ink Cartridges — Required to operate”. Read 24 September 2026.

Add a 35-sheet document feeder to the 2855e and you have the 4255e, which is a meaningful upgrade for anyone who scans more than one page at a time and an irrelevant one for everybody else. The ink is identical, and so is the arithmetic: HP 67XL cartridges rated 240 black and 200 colour pages, at roughly fifteen cents a mono page and thirty-three cents for a page using all the inks. It is the same HP+ model with the same lifetime Original-HP-supplies condition. The feeder is well implemented and unusually generous at this price, so if the machine's job really is digitising a shoebox of receipts twice a year and printing almost nothing, it earns its place. Print regularly and the ink cost will overtake a tank printer's purchase price within months.

Approx. price: ~$119
Cost per mono page: 15¢
Cost per colour page: 33¢
Cost to own, 5,000 pages: ~$1,051
Print speed, mono: 8.5 ISO ppm

Best for

Occasional printing with regular multi-page scanning — the receipts-and-forms household.

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: HP 67XL black cartridge · 240 ISO pages · ~$35.89
Colour consumable: HP 67XL tri-colour cartridge · 200 ISO pages · ~$36.89
Cost per mono page: 15¢
Cost per colour page: 33¢
Cost to own, 5,000 pages: ~$1,051
Cost to own, 200 pages/month for 3 years: ~$1,461 (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

HP DeskJet 4255e~$1,051
~$119 printer + ~$932 supplies
HP DeskJet 2855e~$1,016
~$84 printer + ~$932 supplies
HP OfficeJet Pro 8135e~$686
~$179 printer + ~$507 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: ~$119
Cost per mono page: 15¢
Cost per colour page: 33¢
Cost to own, 5,000 pages: ~$1,051
Cost to own, 3 years: ~$1,461
Technology: Thermal inkjet
Ink system: Tricolor cartridge
Inks: 4
Black consumable: HP 67XL black cartridge · 240 pages
Colour consumable: HP 67XL tri-colour cartridge · 200 pages
Third-party ink lock: Yes
Ink subscription: HP Instant Ink
Print speed, mono: 8.5 ISO ppm
Print speed, colour: 5.5 ISO ppm
Functions: Print · Copy · Scan
Two-sided printing: Manual
Document feeder: 35 sheets
Two-sided scanning: No
Paper capacity: 100 sheets
Max paper size: Letter
Borderless photo: No
Resolution: 4800 × 1200 dpi
Connectivity: Wi-Fi
Mobile printing: AirPrint · Mopria
Display: Mono LCD
Dimensions: 16.9 × 13.2 × 8.1 in
Weight: 11.6 lb
Released: 2024

Features

35-sheet automatic document feeder
100-sheet input tray
Flatbed scanner and standalone copier
Two-cartridge system: black plus tri-colour
Instant Ink subscription available

Document feeder

In its favour

A 35-sheet feeder at this price is genuinely rare
More paper capacity and a little more speed than the 2855e
Compact and light enough to stow away
Good standalone copier for stacks

Against it

Same expensive ink as the 2855e: about 15¢ mono and 33¢ colour per page
HP+ commits it to Original HP supplies for life
No automatic two-sided printing
Tri-colour cartridge wastes two inks when the third runs dry
8.5 ISO ppm black is near the bottom of this catalogue

What owners say

No owner discussion has been collected for the HP DeskJet 4255e 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.