Customer Ratings & Reviews

THE IS AN EXCELLENT PRINTER IT PRINTS GREAT AND ITS FAST.

Great printer, easy to set up, works well over wifi.

I purchased this printer to replace an older HP ink just because of the Brother reputation and my past experience with my Brother laser jet printer. When the printer does connect over wireless and can be found as an air printer by my iphone it works great and print quality is good. But it takes multiple tries to get connected over wifi even using my macbook air sitting tight next to the printer, making it very frustrating to use.

I began using this product in early March 2023. Installation required a call to Brother. Once it was operational it has performed perfectly. I am very pleased.

Excellent Printer; exceeded all expectations: good purchase

I really like this printer. I had a Brother that stopped working and replaced it with this one, which I like much better. It is much more user friendly and easy to operate than the old one.

All in one printer is the best, I am so happy. To buy this item.

Good Printer, works O.K. Very competitive priced!!

Although so much of what we do these days is fully-digital, the need to print physical documents still crops up from time to time -- and when it does, not having a (reliable) printer around is painful. As an adult working in an office environment I have for many years relied on my office printer when the need arises ... but with a new hybrid schedule post-pandemic I've found myself wishing I had a home printer more and more. With this in mind I added this Brother MFC-J1170DW machine to my home office. I chose to go with a Brother printer because of years of positive experiences at work with Brother machines, which I've found to be straightforward, reliable workhorses that rarely need much, if any, intervention. While I'm a big fan of laser printers for their speed and cost-effectiveness, for occasional use at home I elected to go with an inkjet printer to both save physical space and enable color printing when needed. While color laser printers do exist, they're both expensive and bulky, and I knew that level of printing would be lost in my modest home office. Having not researched home printers in a number of years I was pleased to find Brother offered not only a wide selection of models but also multifunctional machines like this J1170DW. I find myself needing to scan documents to the "cloud" more than I need to print them and I quickly realized scanning capabilities at home would be nice to have. With these needs in mind I settled on the Brother MFC-J1170DW. Upon unboxing I was pleasantly surprised at how compact this machine is: it fits perfectly on the bottom shelf of my bookcase, which is exactly where I hoped to place it. I wager Brother did careful research when designing the J1170DW because it seems expressly designed to fit in tight spaces. The paper tray is internal and the entire package needs minimal clearance on the sides and back, making placement on a shelf a no-brainer. Everything folds up in a tidy package when not in use, giving a very sleek appearance. The first hurdle for any printer is initial setup, and I have to say, Brother did a good job here, too. Setup can be largely accomplished using the integrated touchscreen in combination with a smart phone or laptop, assuming you're planning to use this printer via wired/wireless networking. Simply plug in the machine, boot it up, download the Brother app to your phone and follow the step-by-step instructions. I had the printer up and running in a few minutes, with all basic functions enabled. The Brother mobile app isn't the sleekest, but it gets the job done easily and efficiently. After setup you're able to print documents from your phone and -- this is neat -- scan documents directly to your phone, a feature I've already used more than once. You really can use this printer without involving a traditional computer, something I was not expecting. For deeper setup, you'll need to page through the lengthy options menus on the printer's touchscreen, which is thankfully clear and easy to read. In addition to printing/scanning to and from your mobile phone you can link the J1170DW with some of the most popular cloud storage services (Dropbox, OneDrive, Box and more) to print and scan directly from your cloud storage library. As a frequent user of both Dropbox and OneDrive I immediately linked my accounts and found myself able to scan documents directly to the cloud easily. You can also use the touchscreen to scroll through your cloud files and print them, but with the small size of the screen it's generally more efficient to do this on your computer or mobile device and send them to the printer as you might normally. Speaking of computers, I followed Brother's suggestion and downloaded their software and driver package to my Windows 11 laptop. Installation was a breeze and I was pleased to find the full package didn't clog my computer with lots of bloatware. In addition to the official Brother driver package I chose to install the iPrint & Scan application, the printer status monitor and the software update notifier. I didn't think I'd find much use for iPrint & Scan, but I was wrong. The application, like Brother's mobile app, is simple but effective, allowing you to tweak various scan and print options before you input or output your documents. I highly recommend it for scanning, as it lets you set parameters the way you like, and like the printer itself you can link your cloud storage accounts and have your scans save directly to them. Digging into more advanced settings requires accessing the printer's web interface and/or using the touchscreen to change things like wake/sleep time, default behaviors and more. Depending on your level of comfort with these types of systems you may run into some difficulty, but Brother's extensive online support site should help you if you get stuck. For anyone that's used to managing printer settings from a webpage in an office environment you'll find the J1170DW very straightforward and easy to use. Beyond setup and use, I'm pleased with the reliability of the printer and the quality of prints it produces. Colors and text are more than adequate for office documents and general mixed use. If you're looking for high-quality photo printing I'm not sure this printer is what you're looking for, but for moderate home office use it's absolutely capable. This brings me to the ink situation, which is often the make-or-break element of inkjet printers. This Brother uses a newer-style cartridge/tank hybrid system of sorts, wherein you insert four separate ink cartridges (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black) into slots at the front of the machine, from which the printer pulls ink and mixes it internally. This is opposed to the traditional inkjet setup where cartridges are also the dispensing mechanism and are installed directly on the moving printhead. The advantages here are a compact footprint, printhead accuracy, and ink volume (you can purchase regular or XL cartridges and replace them individually as they run out). That being said, this is not a true ink "tank" style printer, and the cartridges are not exactly cheap -- if you do lots of printing, you'll notice the cost. To that end, this machine is eligible for Brother's subscription service, which I would recommend looking into. Brother's "Refresh EZ Print" subscription service offers a few different subscription tiers, all based on the number of pages you anticipate printing per month. Once you've selected a tier and enrolled your machine, you just go about your printing, with the machine monitoring ink levels in the background and automatically ordering new cartridges as needed, all for a flat monthly fee. You can rollover a certain number of unused pages per month, while going over the monthly page limit costs you a set price per page. Depending on your printing habits the Refresh EZ Print service can be a moderate or even major cost-saver, but your mileage may vary. Regardless, paying one set monthly fee and simply receiving cartridges as needed at no additional cost is appealing. Either way, it's worth your time to check this out. Overall, I'm very pleased with the Brother MFC-J1170DW. It prints, scans and copies reliably and at a quality and price perfect for home office or even light business use. The machine itself is compact and attractive, and about as easy to use as a printer can be. The ability to print and scan directly to/from cloud storage services and mobile devices is a huge bonus, and the availability of an affordable subscription program for ink refills is innovative and (possibly) cost-effective. Overall, I recommend this machine and the Brother brand, and advise giving the MFC-J1170DW a good looking-at if you're in the market for a new all-in-one machine.

Enjoying my new printer! Bought it online and I received good delivery time!

Extremely difficult to set up. This is not my first printer. I have been using hp. for years, but because of poor building quality & short life time ,& hp preventing use of refill cartridges I changed companies. This Brother printer is a nightmare & does not include set up info. Why does everyone assume that the person has a mobile phone. I also like them telling you to print out info I would if I had a printer

This machine prints fine, but it EATS INK!!!! Especially the yellow! The ink is VERY expensive and I have to buy it constantly. I would never buy this again.

Don’t buy this printer. Brother is throttling the black ink cartridge availability and Best Buy I’m sure knew this when marking it down for sale. Black ink cartridges appear to be available in Canada but I cannot get them shipped to the US. There should be a class action suit against brother, as it seems the black cartridges are available thru their subscription ink service!

This is my first Brother printer and I have to say I am very pleased. In a small affordable package it does all my printing needs and more! In the box you of course get the printer, line cord, starter ink cartridges, the quick guide and some other papers. The printer itself is fairly compact and light and fits in with my other electronics and PC components. The initial set up is fast and simple with well done instructions. You can be up and printing in minutes. It has multiple options for connecting and printing. You can use Ethernet, Wi-Fi direct, or the good old fashioned USB. For me it of course depends on what and where I need to print from. More on that later. The printer has a very nice color touchscreen that makes it very easy to get to all your settings and what you need done. Printing, scanning, copying, faxing and my favorite wireless printing. Before this the process of getting something from my phone printing was a hassle. Printing directly from my phone is so easy with this printer. Just sent it directly to the printer and its done in seconds. My other printer use to take forever making all kinds of noises before it would print. What was it doing? Anyway one click and the Brother has my printed page out and ready in seconds. Love it. Changing cartridges is really easy as well. But ink is still too expensive it you ask me. I mean to get all your ink replaced you can pay up to half or more of the cost of the printer. But thats not the printers fault. Its that way across the board when it comes to ink replacement. For the price you get a great printer that does pretty much all your standard household would need. Its so easy to set to and use, and prints really fast. I have 2 old printers Ill be throwing out now. Now I just need to find the cheapest ink I can get when I need more. But for now I am very happy with the Brother all in one. Like the name says it does it all. Recommended.

You sold me a printer for which there is no black ink available!! Granted not your fault but you must have known. At any rate, restore my faith in your company and stop selling all Brother printers until Brother makes black ink available.

Having used a few popular brand-named printers, I was a bit skeptical about trying out a Brother brand-named printer. I haven’t really heard much about them and always went for the same brands that I knew. Having gotten this printer, I must say I am changing my tune. The design and quality are as good, if not better than some of those other popular brand-named printers. Set up of this printer is easy. Fill the printer with paper, plug in the power cord, open the ink cartridge cover and insert your cartridges in the correct color slots, and turn on your printer. You will need to set the time and date and follow the on screen instructions to have the printer hooked up to the Wi-Fi. If you are using a wired connection, open the scanner cover and plug in the Ethernet cord. If you are using the fax feature, plug in the phone line to the jack on the printer. A couple of my favorite features on this printer is that it does auto duplex printing. No need to flip the paper over and put it back into the printer, it does it automatically for you. If you have a bunch of papers you want copied, no problem. Place the papers into the automatic document feeder and it pulls in each sheet to copy them. Two sided pages you want copied, it does that too. This printer will hold up to 150 pages and prints fairly quickly in either monochrome or color printing. It has a good sized touch screen to make copying and scanning easy. The printer has a mobile app, so that you can even print photos from your phone or tablet. The only thing I wish was different about this printer is that it would still print if there is no color ink. Unfortunately, if you run out of colored ink and still have plenty of black it, it will not print for you. With all the other great features, in my opinion, this is a minor setback.

The Brother MFC-J1170DW is a great home/home-office printer. In the box is the printer, 4x ink cartridges (Red, Yellow, Blue, Black) and a telephone cable. The latter is so you can connect it to your phone line and use it as a fax - something I didn't test as I don't have a phone line (and does anyone send faxes anymore)? When you turn the printer on it makes a cool chime noise. You are then prompted to install the ink. The ink cartridges are easy to fit (Cartridge Model LC401 if you're wondering). The Black cartridge is a little larger than the colors, since we all tend to print more black than color. Its nice to see Brother thinking ahead. After the ink is installed it takes about 4 minutes for the printer to "charge" the ink. During this time, on first setup you set the date and time. Load paper and do a test/calibration print. The color/touch screen is REALLY good. The best I have used on a printer at this price point. It's up there with thousand dollar corporate printers. It's crystal clear, even in direct sunlight, and super responsive. You can also adjust the angle/tilt of the screen, so it' easier to read at your desk. WiFi Setup was easy, the MFC-J1170DW connected to my mesh WiFi network easily. I used the touch screen to go through the process (and the on screen keyboard). Again, Brother need to be thanked for making such a great touch screen. But the real test of the printer is in the printing itself. I did some test prints of black and white PDFs of reading material for work, and was getting about 19 pages per minute in my test. This is a little faster than what the printer is rated (17) but not super scientific and I had some blank, low text pages in my test. In my color tests, using PowerPoint, I was getting closer to 14 pages per minute (specs are 16) again - not scientific but an impressive result. Scanning was easy too, I did test scans of my CDC Vaccine Card and no complaints about speed or quality. One last thing I will add is this is the first time I have used a Brother printer without having to download their PC or mobile software for setup or use. It's just so good to be able to use a printer without having to install a lot of stuff you just don't want or need. Brother does offer an extra 6 month warranty if you register the printer, but you're not pressured or forced to use their software or ink subscriptions link some other printer makers. The only watch out on the printer is Brother have a weird design choice where LAN (and fax) cables go through a little trough underneath the scanner. I am not sure why Brother do this, but if you want to actually plug this in to ethernet or use it as a fax, just keep in mind where and how you connect the cables is odd. Tip. Make sure you remove the orange cartridge protector before you try and install the cartridges! PS. My MFC-J1170DW is black. It's great to see black printers available again, looks much more at home on my desk next to a black cased gaming PC a black monitor.

So this is our first inkjet printer in probably 10 years. I have been doing color laser for well over a decade, because ink jets were just not reliable. Well.. with the changing market, we decided to give this one a go, when our one printer died. So far.. so good... almost too good. So let's get this out of the way: This comes with a fax port, and wire, and connection... that I have ZERO way to test or even try to use. I was actually really laughing when opening the box and there was a phone cord in there for the fax. So I don't have a review on that other then... yes, it is there. For setup... this was super easy. Very quick connection to the wireless network. Normally I do wired, but we want this one in the kitchen, and we don't have a network jack there. But it was quickly added to our mesh wifi network, and so far: 100% reliable. It is seen by our iPhones, it was seen by our Mac and Windows computer with no funny business... and I haven't had to do any "tweaks" to keep it reliably connected. Now for Print speed: it has been great. From the iPhone, the print out maybe starts in about 15seconds. Computer, depends on what it is.. .but it is almost as fast. And I have NEVER seen an inkjet print at this speed. It is faster then the laser printers. And this is my only nit pick on the printer. It prints so fast, it ejects the paper sometimes too much and it is on the floor. Printer quality is great. I wouldn't say photo realistic quality but for a general color print... it is really good. The printer is a little on the noisy side, doesn't bother us.. but if you have light sleepers or pets, you may want to factor that in. it is very light weight, so in wireless mode, you can relocated this to your work space and have it right next to you.

This Brother MFC-J1170DW is a really nice all-in-one color printer with a small footprint. Scanner/copier function is works great for quick copies and backups. The auto doc feeder on top and auto duplex printing are both big pluses for me – I really appreciate these features in a printer but rarely see them on printers this small so they are really nice functions to have. Printing is quick first page out and speedy continuous printing. Manufacturer claims 16.5 ppm color and 17 ppm black/white which seems right in line with what I’m getting. Setup and connection are very easy. Honestly quite a bit simpler and quicker to get up and going than multiple other printers I’ve had recently. It auto updated all the software including firmware as it was setting up which was nice. Wi-Fi connection was seamless, easy to input password with the large touchscreen display. None of the confusion of various networks, just enter your current Wi-Fi password and then the computer found the printer and setup everything automatically. Obviously has the Wi-Fi which is all I’ve used but nice to know that this can also be used with Wi-Fi Direct, Ethernet or wired connection using a standard USB interface. I’ve used this wirelessly with my laptop, phone, and tablets with no problems whatsoever. Love that this unit can scan directly to my OneDrive and drop box without suing a computer. Software suite is solid and all user friendly, very intuitive. Brother Mobile Connect App and page gauge are right on point and simple to use.

Would not connect to wifi. Returned after geek squad agreed it needed a cable attached to print