HP OfficeJet 5255/5258 Printer Review

The HP 5255 is a well-designed all-in-one printer. The plastic design feels good overall, and the screen is slightly angled so it's not too hard to see. While paper is easy to load, the two input trays look a bit fragile and there's no adjustable slider to help keep different paper lengths aligned when printing. The output tray is also very flimsy too. You can't access the ink cartridges if the printer is off, but they're easy to get to when it's turned on. The scanner has a good document cover that should help provide a uniform white background when scanning, but the lid doesn't have a prop to help keep it open.

The OfficeJet 5255 is a relatively compact printer that isn't too heavy. Its size is suitable for a small home office or dorm room that doesn't have much counter space.

The HP 5255 has a decent monochrome touchscreen display. The black and white icons are plain but easy to see and understand. The touch controls are a bit sensitive, but overall this display isn't difficult to use.

• Power cable
• User manual
• HP 63 Black starter cartridge
• HP 63 Tri-color starter cartridge

The OfficeJet 5255 has a bad cartridge system. It uses only two cartridges, one for black and one for color, and doesn't print very many pages in either black or color, even with the standard replacement cartridges. Thankfully, there are high yield cartridges available which should last a little longer. The printer will also accept third-party cartridges, but this could void its warranty.

The 5255 has great scanning features. The scan resolution and color depth are good. There's an Automatic Document Feeder (ADF) so you can scan long documents automatically. The flatbed is helpful for scanning ID cards or pages from a passport, but isn't large enough for legal documents or tabloid pages.

The cost per print of the OfficeJet 5255 is mediocre. The cartridges cost nearly half the price of the printer. Not only is the price-per-page quite high, but the more you print, the more you end up spending in total.

Keep in mind that even if you print only in black, most inkjet printers continue using the color cartridge for servicing tasks, so you will likely still need to replace it eventually.

The 5255 has a mediocre-at-best printing speed. If you only have one page to print, you can expect to wait a bit. While subsequent pages are a lot quicker, it's still quite slow overall, especially if you have to print in color. On the upside, the tray holds 100 sheets so you shouldn't have to replace the paper too often unless you print a fair bit.

The 5255 has decent color accuracy. You shouldn't have a problem with it unless you rely on very accurate colors for work like graphic design or photography.

The 5255 has decent photo printing quality. Contrast is high and reds are vivid, but grayscale palette is limited. Some detail is missing and there a few small artifacts present.

These results are based on the actual physical photo, not the scanned image provided for reference above, which may not be representative of the printer's photo print quality.

The input tray can be adjusted to support most popular paper formats.

The HP OfficeJet 5255 is a wireless printer with great connectivity features. You can set it up with an existing WiFi network via a router or use its WiFi Direct network. It doesn't have any external storage support so you can't print directly from a USB key or memory card, and it doesn't support Bluetooth, but Apple users can print seamlessly with AirPrint while Android users can use Mopria for mobile printing.

The OfficeJet 5250 uses the HP Smart app, which is a decent mobile printing app available on both iOS and Android. You can print photos and PDF files from it, scan from the printer to your phone, and manage your ink subscription.