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Epson Expression Home XP-5200 Printer Review

Tested using Methodology v1.2
Reviewed Nov 10, 2022 at 10:31 am
Epson Expression Home XP-5200 Picture
7.3
Family
6.6
Small/Home Office
7.4
Student
7.1
Black & White
7.3
Photo

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is a color inkjet all-in-one printer designed for home use and replaces the older Epson Expression Home XP-5100. It has USB and Wi-Fi connectivity, supports Apple AirPrint and Mopria Print Service, and is compatible with Epson's Smart Panel mobile companion app. It has a scanner that supports paper sizes up to 8.5" x 11" but lacks an automatic document feeder and fax functionality. It uses four ink cartridges–cyan, magenta, yellow, and black–and it's compatible with Epson's 222 ink cartridges.

Our Verdict

7.3 Family

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is decent for family use. Although its ink cartridges run out quickly, you won't have to worry too much about high maintenance costs as they're fairly cheap. It has Wi-Fi and USB connectivity as well as support for Apple AirPrint and Mopria Print Service, making it easy for every household member to access the printer. Printed photos look detailed and colorful; however, they aren't very color-accurate, and there's a lot of grain in the pictures. On the upside, the scanner produces outstanding scans, which is great for digitizing photos.

Pros
  • Produces high-quality documents and scans.
  • Good cost per print.
  • Produces detailed and colorful photos.
  • Wired and wireless connectivity.
Cons
  • Low page yields.
  • Photos look grainy.
  • Slow to print color documents.
  • Requires a lot of maintenance.
6.6 Small/Home Office

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is okay for home or small offices. It produces high-quality documents and prints decently fast; however, it requires a lot of maintenance as the ink cartridges run out quickly. Additionally, it only has a flatbed scanner, meaning scanning multi-page documents can be tedious and time-consuming. It has Wi-Fi and USB connectivity but lacks an Ethernet port, which might be problematic for offices that rely on wired networks.

Pros
  • Produces high-quality documents and scans.
  • Good cost per print.
  • Decently sturdy build.
  • Wired and wireless connectivity.
Cons
  • Low page yields.
  • No automatic feeder.
  • Slow to print color documents.
  • Requires a lot of maintenance.
7.4 Student

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is decent for student use. It has Wi-Fi and USB connectivity and supports Apple AirPrint and Mopria Print Service, making it easy to print from various devices. It produces high-quality black and color documents, and its overall printing speed is decent, so you don't have to wait too long to print a long paper or essay. Its ink cartridges yield a small number of prints, which means you'll have to replace them often, but they're relatively cheap, which helps keep your maintenance costs low. Unfortunately, it only has a flatbed scanner, and its lid hinges don't extend, making it hard to close the lid over thicker items like textbooks.

Pros
  • Produces high-quality documents and scans.
  • Good cost per print.
  • Wired and wireless connectivity.
Cons
  • Low page yields.
  • Slow to print color documents.
  • Requires a lot of maintenance.
7.1 Black & White

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is decent for printing black-and-white documents. It produces high-quality documents and is decently fast, pushing out 15 pages per minute. Its black ink cartridge runs out quickly, which means you'll have to replace it regularly, but the cost per print remains low because the ink cartridges are relatively cheap. Unfortunately, it only has a flatbed scanner, so scanning long, multi-page documents can be very time-consuming.

Pros
  • Produces high-quality documents and scans.
  • Good cost per print.
  • Decently sturdy build.
Cons
  • Low page yields.
  • No automatic feeder.
  • Requires a lot of maintenance.
7.3 Photo

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is decent for photo printing. It prints on glossy paper and supports various paper sizes up to 8.5" x 11". Printed pictures look detailed and colorful, but they aren't very color-accurate, and there's a lot of graininess. It requires a lot of maintenance because the ink cartridges run out quickly; however, the cost per print is still low as the cartridges are relatively cheap.

Pros
  • Good cost per print.
  • Produces detailed and colorful photos.
  • Decently sturdy build.
Cons
  • Photos look grainy.
  • Requires a lot of maintenance.
  • Sub-par color accuracy.
  • 7.3 Family
  • 6.6 Small/Home Office
  • 7.4 Student
  • 7.1 Black & White
  • 7.3 Photo
  1. Updated Nov 10, 2022: Review published.
  2. Updated Nov 08, 2022: Early access published.
  3. Updated Nov 02, 2022: Our testers have started testing this product.
  4. Updated Nov 01, 2022: The product has arrived in our lab, and our testers will start evaluating it soon.
  5. Updated Sep 28, 2022: We've purchased the product and are waiting for it to arrive in our lab.

Differences Between Sizes And Variants

We tested the Epson Expression Home XP-5200 in black. There are no other variants.

You can see our unit's label here.

Compared To Other Printers

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is a decent home printer but doesn't stand out in any way compared to other printers in its price range. Its overall printing speed is a little better than other similar inkjet printers; however, it takes much longer to initialize and get a single page out.

For more options, check out our recommendations for the best home printers, the best inkjet printers, and the best all-in-one printers.

Epson Expression Home XP-4200

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is better than the Epson Expression Home XP-4200. The XP-5200 feels better built, uses Epson 222 cartridges with a higher page yield, and prints faster. On the other hand, the XP-4200 is a little easier to maintain.

Canon PIXMA TS6420a

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is better than the Canon PIXMA TS6420a. The Epson produces higher-quality prints and scans, and its ink cartridges last longer, lowering its cost per print. The Epson also prints black and documents faster, nearly twice as fast as the HP. However, the Epson requires more maintenance, as its nozzles clog more easily. Additionally, the Epson printer's design isn't as user-friendly, as it's harder to access paper jams.

Brother MFC-J1205W/MFC-J1215W

The Brother MFC-J1205W is much better than the Epson Expression Home XP-5200. The Brother has a sturdier build and a design that allows easier access to paper jams. It also yields more prints than the Epson, which leads to a much lower cost per print. However, the Epson prints slightly faster and produces higher-quality scans.

HP ENVY 6055e

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is much better than the HP ENVY 6055e. The Epson has better print quality, higher page yields, and lower print costs. It also prints faster and has a display, making navigating the settings menu easier.

Epson Expression Home XP-4100

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is better than the Epson Expression Home XP-4100. The XP-5200 produces higher-quality black-and-white documents and prints much faster. Also, the XP-5200's ink cartridges yield more prints, which leads to lower maintenance costs. The XP-5200's scanner produces better scans with finer details, but it tends to boost contrast and color saturation, which isn't ideal if you care about accuracy.

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Test Results

perceptual testing image
Design
7.0
Design
Build Quality
Type All in One

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200's plastic build feels relatively sturdy, with no flimsy parts or obvious gaps in the construction. The input ports feel solid, and the power cord is removable, so it's easy to replace if it gets damaged. However, there are some downsides to its design. The scanner's background is only a thin piece of plastic, and the lid hinges don't extend, making it hard to scan thicker items like textbooks. Although there's a good damper to hold the printer open for maintenance, accessing the ink cartridges and paper jams is hard because the printer only opens partially, so there isn't much space to maneuver. You can also access the sheet rollers through the back panel, but again, there isn't much space.

There was a cracking sound coming from the printer early on in our testing. Nothing broke, but the photo we were printing at the time had shifted slightly to the right and was stuck mid-way in the sheet rollers, even though the rollers were still turning. It's unclear what caused the issue, and it never happened again.

Design
Dimensions
Height 7.2" (18.3 cm)
Width 14.7" (37.4 cm)
Depth 13.5" (34.4 cm)
Height When In Use
7.2" (18.3 cm)
Width When In Use
14.7" (37.4 cm)
Depth When In Use
15.0" (38.0 cm)
Weight
12.0 lbs (5.4 kg)
5.0
Design
Expected Maintenance
Ink Related Maintenance
Expected
Drum Unit
No Drum Unit

The Epson Expression XP-5200 requires a lot of maintenance. Like most inkjet printers, the printheads can clog if you don't use the printer for an extended period. There are built-in functions to resolve clogging issues, like Printhead Cleaning and Printhead Nozzle Check. There are also other functions to resolve any print issues you might encounter, like Printhead Alignment, Power Cleaning, and Paper Guide Cleaning. You'll likely need to replace the ink cartridges often, as they run out fairly quickly. To replace them, you have to lift the top of the printer and select the Ink Cartridge Replacement function in the menu. The printer goes through a 4-minute initialization process after putting in new cartridges. The input tray holds 150 sheets of paper, so depending on how much you print, you may need to refill it regularly. You can access paper jams through the back panel or by lifting the top of the printer, but as mentioned in the build section, there isn't much space to maneuver.

We had some print quality issues out of the box, as there were large dark bands when printing color documents, which you can see in this photo. We aren't sure what caused it, and the issue resolved itself after leaving the printer idle for a few days. We also had signs of clogged nozzles when performing the Black and White document test, which you can see in the Printing Speed test video, but again, the issue resolved itself after leaving the printer idle for a few days.

You can see the user manual here.

6.5
Design
Display Screen
Display Screen Yes
Display Screen Size
2.4" (6.1 cm)
Touchscreen No

The Epson XP-5200's display is okay. It has good vertical viewing angles, so it's easy to see from above and below, and you can tilt the whole front panel to improve visibility. As for the horizontal viewing angles, it's good from the left but poor from the right. It has a newly revamped user interface with more rounded corners and colors, but the menu is the same as other Epson home printers and is just as user-friendly. The display isn't touch-sensitive, so you'll have to rely on the surrounding physical buttons to navigate. On the upside, the buttons are clicky and responsive.

5.7
Design
Cartridge
Technology Inkjet
SuperTank
No
Photo Cartridge
No
Color Yes
Number Of Color Cartridges
3
Black Cartridge Model
Epson 222 Black
Tested Black Page Yield
13 prints
Estimated Black Page Yield
247 prints
Color Cartridge Model
Epson 222 C/M/Y
Tested Color Page Yield
9 prints
Estimated Color Page Yield
191 prints
Third Party Cartridge
Not Found At Time Of The Review
Ink Type
Dye And Pigment
High Yield Cartridge
Yes

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 yields a low number of black prints, so you'll have to replace the black ink cartridge often. Its color page yield is better but still not that great. A message pops up when the ink cartridges are running low or empty. If a color cartridge runs out, you can continue printing in black temporarily, although it's unclear how long this temporary status lasts. For black and white printing, if the black ink level is low, you can continue printing using the color inks to produce a composite black. However, if the black ink cartridge is completely empty, the printer will stop printing. In regards to high-yield cartridges, there's only an Epson 222XL Black ink cartridge. There aren't any high-yield cartridges for the other colors.

6.1
Design
Scanner Features
Scanner
Flatbed
ADF Capacity
N/A
Scan Speed
1 PPM
Duplex Scanning
No
Max Flatbed Scan Size
8.5" x 11"
Max ADF Scan Size
No ADF
Flatbed Hinge Adjustability
0.00" (0 mm)
Fax
No
Copy
Yes
OCR Included
Software

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 has mediocre scanner features. It only has a flatbed scanner, so scanning long, multi-page documents can be very time-consuming. Also, the hinges don't extend, making it difficult to close the lid over thicker items like textbooks. To use the optical character recognition feature (OCR), you need to scan the documents through the Epson Scan 2 software and save the scan as a 'Searchable PDF'. It works well most of the time; it mainly makes mistakes when there are special characters.

9.5
Design
Scan Quality
Max Scan Resolution
1,200 DPI
Max Scan Color Depth
24Bit

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200's scan quality is outstanding. The scanner seems to boost the contrast and color saturation slightly. Aside from the white text on a red background, the rest of the text in the document looks clear, and finer details, like the lines in the graph, are present.

Design
In The Box

  • Epson 222 starter ink cartridges:
    • 1x Black
    • 1x Cyan
    • 1x Magenta
    • 1x Yellow
  • Power cord
  • User guide

Design
Battery
Advertised Battery Life
N/A
Tested Charging Time
N/A
Document
9.0
Document
Black & White Documents
Color Ink Needed For Black & White
Yes

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200's print quality for black and white documents is outstanding. The text looks sharp, and all the fine elements are present. There's a slight alignment issue on the second page where the 'Year 2' text is, but it's very hard to spot, and it isn't an issue when printing in the High-Quality mode. As mentioned in the cartridge section, you can temporarily continue printing in black if a color cartridge runs out. However, this temporary status only applies to printing on plain paper or envelopes. It doesn't work for borderless printing. As such, we consider color ink necessary for black-and-white printing.

7.5
Document
Color Documents

The Epson Expression XP-5200 prints color documents well. The text looks sharp, and most of the fine elements are visible. However, the colors look slightly faded, and there are some very minor alignment issues, which you can see in the table on the second page.

7.7
Document
Cost-Per-Print
Black Cartridge Price
19.99 US$
Color Cartridge Price
28.45 US$
Black-Only Printing Cost
0.081 US$/print
Color Printing Cost
0.149 US$/print
Photo Printing Cost
0.395 US$/print
Ink Subscription
No

The Epson XP-5200 has a good cost per print. Although the ink cartridges don't last very long and need regular replacement, they're relatively cheap, which helps keep maintenance costs low.

7.0
Document
Printing Speed
Black Only Text Document
15 PPM
Color Document
7 PPM
Photo Printing Time
88.0 s
Single Page Out Time (Black Only)
18.8 s
Duplex Printing
Automatic
Input Tray Capacity
150 pages

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 prints black documents decently fast, but it's slow at printing color documents and photos. It also takes a while to initialize and get a single page out. There isn't a manual feeder; it only has one input tray. The tray holds 150 sheets of regular paper, 50 sheets of plain legal paper, 20 sheets of photo paper, 10 envelopes, or 1 sheet of plain custom-size paper.

Document
Document Printing Sizes
Letter (8.5" x 11") Yes
Legal (8.5" x 14") Yes
Tabloid (11" x 17") No
A6 (105mm x 148mm) Yes
A5 (148mm x 210mm) Yes
A4 (210mm x 297mm) Yes
Max Paper Weight
297 g/m²

Epson doesn't advertise the maximum paper weight. The posted 297 g/m² is the weight of the thickest compatible paper, the Epson Ultra Premium Photo Paper Glossy. You can set custom paper sizes from 3.5" x 5" to 8.5" to 47.2" (89mm x 127mm to 215.9mm to 1,200 mm).

Photo
7.0
Photo
Color Gamut

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 has a decent color gamut. It mainly struggles with bright saturated tones like purple, green, and yellow. It also has trouble with darker shades of green. There isn't much banding, but the color transitions look grainy.

5.1
Photo
Color Accuracy
Average Color dE
9.88

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200's color accuracy is sub-par. The colors look slightly oversaturated, and the whole image has a warm tone. The pictures are still visually-pleasing, just not very accurate.

8.5
Photo
Small Details
Max Print Resolution (DPI)
4800 x 1200

The Epson Expression Home XP-5200 is excellent at printing small, fine details. You can easily see the general structure of the Tokyo Tower and the individual balconies at the bottom of the sample photo. The main issue is that the halftoning (dots) causes some loss of details; it's very noticeable when you compare it to a better photo printer like the Epson EcoTank Photo ET-8550.

9.5
Photo
Photo Printing Sizes
Glossy Paper (4" x 6") Yes
Glossy Paper (5" x 7") Yes
Glossy Paper (8" x 10") Yes
Glossy Paper (8.5" x 11") Yes
Glossy Paper (13" x 19") No
Borderless Printing
Yes
Mobile App And Connectivity
7.0
Mobile App And Connectivity
Connectivity
Ethernet
No
USB Input To Computer
Yes
Wireless Yes
Bluetooth
No
Wi-Fi via Router
Yes
Wi-Fi Direct
Yes
External Storage Support
No
Apple AirPrint
Yes
Mopria Print Service
Yes
10
Mobile App And Connectivity
Mobile App
Mobile App Yes
App Name Epson Smart Panel
iOS Yes
Android Yes
Photo (JPEG, PNG)
Android and iOS
PDF
Android and iOS
Microsoft Office Files
Android Only
Text Files (TXT)
Android Only
Webpages (HTML)
Android and iOS

The Epson Expression XP-5200 has an outstanding mobile companion app. You can use it to print, scan (with your smartphone's camera), copy, and perform maintenance tasks, like checking the ink level and cleaning the printheads. You can copy both sides of an ID card onto a single page, create a QR code to let guests connect to the printer, access the user manual, and watch how-to videos. It has Google Class integration, so you can quickly print your assignments from Google Classroom. It includes links to Epson's Creative Print app and Epson's Gallery website. The former lets you create collages with your photos, and the latter contains patterns you can use for various crafts, like decorations, Christmas cards, and book covers.

Mobile App And Connectivity
OS Compatibility
Windows Fully
macOS Fully
Chrome OS Fully

You don't need to install any drivers to use the printer on macOS and Chrome OS, but you do on Windows. You can find the Windows drivers here.