Epson WorkForce Pro WF-4830 Printer Review

The Epson WorkForce WF-4830's build quality is excellent. It has a sturdy-feeling plastic body, with two paper trays to accommodate different paper sizes and easy access to paper jams and ink cartridges. The scanner lid stays fully open on its own, meaning you don't have to hold it, and its hinges extend to accommodate thicker items on the scanning bed, like textbooks and magazines.

Like most inkjet printers, the Epson WorkForce Pro WF-4833 requires some maintenance as the printheads can clog if you don't use it for a long time. There are a few maintenance functions built-in to help resolve this issue, like head cleaning, nozzle check, and head alignment. You'll have to replace the ink cartridges fairly often as they have low page yields, though you can get XL cartridges that'll last longer. The printer needs to be on to change the cartridges, but the process is easy, and the printer will let you know if you installed them properly. You can access the sheet rollers via a panel on the back to remove paper jams. The two input trays hold a total of 500 sheets of paper, so you won't have to refill them all that often. You can see the user's manual here. There's a removable maintenance box that stores ink flushed during the printhead cleaning at the right rear corner of the printer, which you need to replace when it's full.

The display is excellent. It's responsive, and the settings menu is user-friendly. Visibility is good whether you're sitting or standing, and you can also tilt the panel to make it easier to see. However, it's much harder to see from the sides.

The cartridge system is only alright. The black cartridge runs out quickly; however, the color cartridge's yield is good, meaning you won't have to replace them as often unless you print a lot. Although having three color cartridges means you can change the empty ones without needing to replace them all at once, the printer doesn't let you print in color if any are empty. Likewise, you can't print in color if it's out of black ink. There are high-capacity Epson T822XL cartridges available if you want to increase the yield, which might be cheaper in the long run and more environmentally friendly.

The Epson WF-4833 has a feature-rich scanner. Its automatic document feeder can perform duplex scanning, making the task of scanning long, two-sided documents hassle-free. To scan double-sided sheets, the printer does two passes. The flatbed scanner lid stays fully open on its own, so you don't need to hold it, and its lid hinges extend to accommodate thicker items, like a textbook or thick document. The Epson WF-4820 variant also has an ADF but doesn't support duplex scanning, and its feeder can only hold 35 sheets. Its built-in OCR (Optical Character Recognition) lets you scan documents and save them as a PDF so that you can perform quick keyword searches, though it makes frequent mistakes. If you need a larger flatbed scanner, check out the Epson WorkForce Pro WF-7840.

The scan quality is great. Scanned documents look clear with very little noise; however, colors look lighter than the originals, and fine details, like the lines in the graphs, look pale. The Epson WorkForce Pro WF-4820 variant will perform similarly.

• User manual
• Installation CD
• Detachable power cord
• Epson Starter Cartridges T822
  • 1x T822-I Black
  • 1x T822-I Cyan
  • 1x T822-I Magenta
  • 1x T822-I Yellow

Black and white documents look great. Text looks very sharp, but there's a lot of grain in the colored areas, and you can clearly see the halftoning (dots) in the 'Sample' text. The printer uses some blue ink to print black and white documents if you select the 'Black and White' option in the print settings, as you can see a light blue tint in this image.

The Epson WF-4833 prints color documents well. Although the colors look a little pale, and there's some coloring in the grays, the documents look clear, with lots of fine details.

The cost-per-print is great. The overall maintenance cost remains relatively low over time, but color printing can get expensive if you print a lot.

The Epson WorkForce WF-4834 prints black documents quickly, but it's slow to print color documents. Its photo printing speed is decent and about the same as most inkjet printers. There are two input trays; each tray holds 250 sheets of paper. The Epson WF-4820 variant has only one 250-sheet input tray.

If you want a printer-only unit that performs similarly but can print on sheets as large as 13" x 19" A3+ format, check out the Epson WorkForce Pro WF-7310.

The Epson WorkForce WF-4833 has an okay color gamut. Except for greens, it prints most bright, saturated colors well. However, it struggles with dark blues and greens, as well as light blues and pinks. Unfortunately, there's a lot of grain and banding when transitioning from one color to another. The Epson WF-4820 variant will perform similarly.

The color accuracy is okay. It's good enough for a splash of color on a report or to print out family photos, but you may be disappointed if your work or hobbies depend on exact color reproduction. It especially struggles with blue tones.

This printer is outstanding at producing fine details. You can clearly see the Tokyo Tower's structure in the sample photo, even the individual metal bars at the top. However, the use of halftones (dots) to produce the different shades and colors is visible and affects the overall print quality.

The Epson WF-4833 can print directly off a USB flash drive. The USB port is on the front left side of the printer.

The Epson iPrint app lets you print, scan, and copy from your smartphone. You can also perform maintenance tasks like checking ink levels, head cleaning, and alignment, and you can purchase ink directly from the app. This printer is also compatible with Epson's Smart Panel app, which provides easier access to functions like ID Scan and Preset Scan. However, it can't convert Text, HTML, and Office files, which the Epson iPrint app can do.