The best iPhone printer: take photos and print them out on the move with these portable picks chosen by real pro photographers

I love to carry one of the best iPhone printers around with me – especially to a party or a wedding. These little devices enable you to print images straight from your phone, wherever you are. They can be shots you've taken with your phone, or shots you've downloaded from your mirrorless camera, or even pics and memes you've saved from the internet!

Having one of these printers effectively transforms my iPhone into an instant camera, so I can give people a physical memento of the occasion (rather than just WhatsApping them a photo that disappears into a camera roll, never to be seen again).

There are plenty of great portable printers on the market, but not all of them are iOS-friendly. So, these are the best iPhone printers you can get your hands on right now.

James Artaius

Having fallen in love with conventional photo printing while apprenticing as a photographer a decade ago, I was excited to be able to print photos on my iPhone as well. I regularly print single prints and entire photo albums from my iPhone, and I have a whole shelf of these printers in my camera room!

The Quick List

Best quality iPhone printer

The Canon Selphy QX10 was my favorite iPhone printer and the one I recommended to most users. Its successor, the Canon Selphy QX20 dye-sub pocket printer, which retains everything that was great about the previous version while also adding more options and flexibility.

Whereas the Selphy QX10 could only print square photos with white borders, the QX20 has been upgraded to offer borderless printing in two formats – square and 3:2. Another welcome addition is the upgrade of the USB connection to USB-C, rather than the micro USB on the previous version.

Once again, you get those punchy and vibrant colors from the dye-sublimation technology in prints that take less than a minute to produce and are smudge-proof and water-protected. Treat your prints from the Selphy QX20 right, and they’ll last much longer than your iPhone will! This lightweight printer is great for parties, trips, days out, and more.

See our full Canon Selphy QX20 review

Best iPhone printer for mini prints

Retro tech is back – and the Instax Mini Link+ turns digital shots from your iPhone into real instant film prints. I've used several of Instax's printers with my iPhone, and the Instax Mini Link+ is my favorite.

Images are sharper, and the colors are more accurate, though they still have that charming film format. If you want to print images overlaid with text, the Mini Link+ outperforms the older models.

Like earlier models, the printer is easy to use. You can use the Instax app to print any photos that are on your iPhone, whether you shot them with your iPhone or transferred them from another camera. The film only loads one direction, so the setup process is simple as well.

If you want bigger prints, then consider the Mini's big brother – the Instax Link Wide 2 which gives you prints that are twice the size, with an image measuring 99 x 62mm on a 108 x 85mm print.

Read the full Instax Mini Link+ review

Best hybrid iPhone printer and camera

Why limit yourself to just a printer when you can have a printer that's also an instant camera – and a very good one, at that! The Mini Evo gives you the best of both worlds, functioning as an iPhone printer (which, again, prints onto real Instax Mini film instead of paper) and a great Instax camera.

This has knocked off my previous favorite hybrid printer, the Instax Mini LiPlay, thanks to its updated retro design complete with a funky little film lever that you use to print out your photos – making this a fantastically tactile bit of tech as well. With plenty of filters (ten digital lens modes and ten film modes), a built-in flash and the ability to edit your photos before you print them, this is formidable both as a printer and a camera.

However, many folks may not see the appeal of having a printer that doubles as a camera – after all, your iPhone has a far superior camera to the 4.9MP, 1/5in sensor, 28mm f/2.0 module here. Especially since it only has storage for 45 images, requiring you to buy a microSD card to expand the storage.

Still, if you want to print phone photos and you love instant photography, I can assure you that the Mini Evo is a heck of a lot of fun – and a big hit at parties!

If you want bigger prints, consider the newer Instax Wide Evo - that supersizes this hybrid digital instant camera.

Read our full Instax Mini Evo review

Best iPhone printer for travel

This super-small, super-lightweight print goes by different names depending on where you are in the world; it’s the Canon Ivy 2 in the USA, and the Canon Zoemini 2 in the UK and Europe. Either way, it’s an impressive little iPhone printer that produces decent Zink prints on 2 x 3-inch paper, just a little smaller than a credit card, connecting to your phone via Bluetooth. It’s a fairly simple proposition, but it’s easy to use and it works well.

In our review, we appreciated the stylish design of the Ivy 2, as well as its ease of use in terms of loading the paper and controlling your printing via the app. ZINK is definitely the worst option in terms of common printing methods, with both dye-sublimation and inkjet producing better quality, but the Ivy 2 does a decent enough job with the images you give it – good, if not great. A good choice for casual fun, and especially for travel, where you don’t want to be toting around an expensive, heavy, complex printer.

Read our full Canon Ivy 2 review.

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Sample prints from Canon Ivy 2 / Zoemini 2

Best for full-size prints

Pocketable photo printers are convenient, but they only make small prints. The Canon Pixma TR160 / Maxify BX110 is like a cross between a portable photo printer and a fully-fledged desktop printer.

The Pixma TR160 / Maxify BX110 is far from pocketable, but it's a portable printer that still prints up to the standard letter size. Yes, that means documents too, but the photo print quality is pretty good for a printer at this price point.

To print from an iPhone, the printer supports AirPrint to print without downloading any apps. Or, the Canon Print app also supports iOS 17 or later, and has functions like using your iPhone camera as a scanner. There's no Bluetooth, however.

The replacement cost of XL cartridges is competitive, at around $20 / £19 for the black cartridge, and $18 / £15.50 for the tri-color cartridge. For 6x4-inch photos, including sheets of high-quality Canon Photo Paper Plus Glossy II, you’re looking at around US 40c / UK 40p, which I think is pretty reasonable.

While not a pocketable printer, the Pixma TR160 / Maxify BX110 packs down much smaller than a typical desktop printer, making it easy to fit in a drawer or suitcase. There's also an option to get a battery pack for true on-the-go prints.

Read the full Canon Pixma TR160 / Maxify BX110 review

Best retro style iPhone printer

If you want something easy to use, the Kodak Mini 2 Retro is a good choice. Its accompanying iOS app makes it super simple to print out pictures from your iPhone, plus it's compatible with all iPhones running iOS 8.0 and above. The Mini 2 Retro gives you a choice of stylized yellow, white or black designs - and I particularly love the yellow one for its vintage Kodak vibe.

The printer simply connects to your iPhone via Bluetooth - so with this model there are no wi-fi or NFC options. But in our tests, this worked well, and provides borderless miniature photos (once you detach the white leader from the print).

Produced through a dye sublimation process, prints are vibrant, bright, and detailed, with strong colors, and you can even print straight from your social media accounts. Plus the printer uses all-in-one ink-and-paper cartridges, which makes it easier to operate than devices that require separate paper and ink.

Unlike some other dye-sub printers, the Mini 2 Retro is supplied with enough ink/paper cassettes to produce your first 68 prints - which when you factor this into the price can make this a bargain buy.

See our full Kodak Mini 2 Retro review

How to choose

There are many considerations when looking for the best iPhone printer. For me personally, I think you need to think about two things. First of all: do you want a portable printer so you can produce images on the move, or do you want something that will pretty much live in your office or on a desk?

Smaller options, like the Instax Mini Link+, are much more travel-friendly. Then there are bulkier models, like the Canon Selphy Square QX20 and Polaroid Lab, that are much happier living a more stationary life.

The second question to ask is how important image quality is to you. If you want the best prints possible, look for a dye-sublimation (dye-sub) printer like the Canon Selphy or Kodak Mini 2 Retro.

Otherwise, the Instax Links "print" into instant film, which gives very unique results, while Zink (Zero Ink) printers like the Canon Ivy/Zoemini 2 offer image quality that's more like a color photocopy.

Other than that, things to consider include battery life, ease of recharging (such as which kind of USB plug is needed), stability of communication, and ease of use.

FAQs

You can even get portable printers (such as the Canon TR160 / BX110, in this guide) that print full-size documents that are compatible with AirPrint, but the term "portable" is probably used too loosely for this type of device.

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