HP Smart Tank 5000 Review – 2 Years of Ink, Zero Cartridge Hassle

Quick Verdict

The HP Smart Tank 5000 is a cartridge-free all-in-one ink tank printer built for home offices that print frequently and want to stop buying cartridges every few weeks. Two years of ink ships in the box, refill bottles are mess-free, and the overall running cost sits well below traditional inkjet territory. The trade-offs are a slower print speed than some rivals and a setup process that requires patience. If you print more than 100 pages a month and value long-term savings over plug-and-play speed, this HP ink tank printer earns a solid recommendation – I'd rate it 4.2 out of 5.

What Is the HP Smart Tank 5000?

The HP Smart Tank 5000 is a wireless all-in-one inkjet printer that replaces traditional ink cartridges with a pair of transparent refillable tanks mounted on the right side of the chassis. It prints, scans and copies, connects over dual-band Wi-Fi, and ships with enough Original HP ink to produce up to 6,000 black pages and 6,000 color pages before you ever need to buy more. HP positions it as a direct competitor to the EcoTank line from Epson, with its own version of the mess-free bottle-fill system. The model number in the box is 5D1B6A, and it carries a one-year hardware warranty backed by HP's premium support team.

Right out of the box the design feels sturdier than the typical budget inkjet. The paper tray extends cleanly, the tank windows let you monitor ink levels at a glance, and the control panel is simple – a small monochrome display, a few buttons and a numeric keypad for copy jobs. No touchscreen, but the buttons are responsive and the labeling is clear.

Key Features

• Up to 2 years of Original HP ink included – 6,000 black and 6,000 color pages per set of bottles
• Mess-free bottle refill system – plug-and-drain bottles, no squeezing required
• HP Smart app for iOS and Android – print, scan and manage from your phone
• Dual-band Wi-Fi with Wi-Fi Direct for cable-free printing from any device
• HP AI-powered Smart Layout – formats web pages and emails to fit the page cleanly
• Borderless printing support up to 8.5 x 11 inches
• Compact footprint for a tank printer – fits on most home office desks without crowding

Hands-On Review

I'll be honest – the unboxing moment was underwhelming. The printer is compact but packed with foam, and there are more protective strips and tape pieces than I'd like. By the time I had everything unstowed and the ink bottles lined up, I was already 10 minutes in and hadn't printed a single page. HP's instructions are clear, though, and the bottle design genuinely works: you seat each bottle in its color-coded port, it seals automatically, and the ink flows without any pressure or squeezing. No splatter, no stained fingers. That alone is a win over the EcoTank experience I've had in the past.

Setup on Wi-Fi took another 12 minutes on my first attempt. The HP Smart app found the printer quickly over a 5 GHz connection, and after a firmware update and one alignment page, I was printing. What surprised me was the wireless reliability – I've used printers that drop Wi-Fi every few days, but the Smart Tank 5000 has held its connection through two router restarts and a weekend of disuse without needing a reconnect. That's not nothing in a home environment with multiple devices competing for bandwidth.

Print quality on the default setting is genuinely good. Text at 10pt is crisp with no visible banding, and color documents – the kind of marketing flyers I occasionally throw together for neighborhood stuff – look punchy and saturated. The HP AI Smart Layout feature in the driver is subtle but useful: when I print a web article, it strips the clutter and reformats it to fill the page properly rather than preserving the awful wide-column layout you'd get from a raw print. It's the kind of thing you don't notice until it's missing.

The 12 ppm black speed is adequate for a home printer but not brisk. On a 20-page contract draft I printed on a Tuesday evening, the printer needed about 90 seconds of warm-up and then sustained roughly 10-11 pages per minute – faster than HP's spec in practice, but noticeably slower than the 15-20 ppm laser-class printers in this price bracket. If you're printing 200 pages in a single sitting, you'll feel it. For daily use with 5-20 page jobs, it holds up fine.

Scanning via the flatbed is straightforward. The lid is lightweight and the hinges hold position at any angle, which sounds minor until you're scanning a thick book and need to keep one hand free. The HP Smart app handles scan-to-PDF and scan-to-phone jobs smoothly, though the optical resolution maxes out at 1200 dpi – perfectly fine for documents and receipts, not ideal for high-resolution photo work.

Who Should Buy It?

The HP Smart Tank 5000 is a strong fit for households that print regularly – homework packets, freelance contracts, small-business flyers, or general home office work – and want to stop the recurring cartridge expense bleeding into every month. If you currently spend $40-60 on cartridges every 6-8 weeks, the math tips in this printer's favor within the first year of ownership. The mess-free refill system also makes it less intimidating for less tech-confident users who have been burned by cartridge leaks in the past.

Skip this if you print fewer than 50 pages a month – the upfront cost is harder to justify for light use, and a basic cartridge printer will serve you just fine. Also skip it if you need automatic duplex scanning or ethernet connectivity, because neither is on the spec sheet. And if print speed is the top priority for a shared home office with multiple users printing large batches daily, look at laser-class alternatives that won't leave you waiting between pages.

Alternatives Worth Considering

Epson EcoTank ET-2850 – Epson's closest competitor in the same price tier offers similar page yields and a slightly faster 14.5 ppm print speed. Choose the EcoTank ET-2850 if you prefer Epson's driver interface or already use Epson ink for other equipment.

Canon G7020 – If you need an automatic document feeder for batch scanning and copying, Canon's MegaTank G7020 adds a 35-sheet ADF that the HP lacks. It's larger and pricier, but the ADF makes a real difference for home-office productivity.

Brother INKvestment Tank MFC-J1010DW – Brother's approach uses high-yield cartridge tanks rather than open refillable bottles, which some users prefer for sealed reliability. The trade-off is higher ongoing ink cost compared to the HP Smart Tank system.

FAQ

Final Verdict

The HP Smart Tank 5000 solves the problem it set out to solve: it cuts the ongoing cost of home printing and removes the annoyance of cartridge replacements without sacrificing output quality. The two years of ink included in the box represent genuine value, the mess-free refill system works as advertised, and the wireless stack has been reliable in three weeks of daily use. It isn't the fastest ink tank printer available, and the lack of an ADF limits its appeal for heavier home office workloads, but for moderate-volume home printing the HP Smart Tank 5000 delivers where it counts most. I'd buy it again for a home setup like mine, and I'd recommend it to anyone tired of watching ink cartridge prices creep up every year.