MFC-J5340DW

Here is an in-depth, real-world review of the Brother MFC-J5340DW which I bought mainly for photo printing. If you run a busy home office, manage a small business, or frequently need to print large spreadsheets, floor plans, or layout designs without owning a massive, floor-standing office copier, this machine hits a very specific sweet spot. At its core, the MFC-J5340DW is a robust A4 machine designed for copying, scanning, and faxing. However, it features a rear manual feed slot that accepts single sheets of A3 paper. Design & Build Quality Footprint: For a printer with A3 capabilities, it is remarkably compact (53cm×39.8cm×30.5cm). It is chunky and built like a tank, weighing around 17kg, which means it won't shake your desk to pieces during a high-speed print run. Paper Capacity: The front-loading main paper drawer holds a full 250 sheets of standard A4 paper, meaning you aren't constantly refilling it during large print jobs. Control Panel: It features a crisp, tilting 6.8cm color touchscreen. The interface is intuitive, uncluttered, and responsive, making it easy to jump between scanning to a cloud drive or checking ink levels. Performance & Print Quality 1. Speed That Rivals Laser Printers Brother utilizes their "MAXIDRIVE" print chip here, and it shows. It clocks in at print speeds of up to 28 pages per minute (ppm) in both mono and color. The first page out time is less than 5 seconds. If you are used to older consumer inkjets that slowly chug along, the sheer velocity of this machine will be a massive surprise. 2. Text and Graphic Quality The printer uses pigment-based inks across all four colors (Black, Cyan, Magenta, Yellow). Text: Documents are sharp, dark, and highly legible. Because pigment ink sits on top of the paper fibres rather than soaking in, text lacks the fuzzy edges common with dye-based inkjets. Durability: The printed text is highly smudge-resistant and stands up well to highlighters or water splashes right off the tray. Graphics: Chart lines and color blocks are vibrant and clean, making it excellent for business reports. 3. Scanning and Copying The 50-sheet Automatic Document Feeder (ADF) on top makes scanning multi-page stacks of forms, receipts, or contracts incredibly simple. It scans quickly and cleanly directly to your PC, an email address, or network folders. Connectivity & Mobile App Wireless setup is painless over dual-band (2.4GHz/5GHz) Wi-Fi. It supports Apple AirPrint and Mopria for driverless printing from phones which I can honestly say works really well and is a massive bonus over my old Epson printer. The Brother Mobile Connect app is excellent. It lets you send print jobs from your phone, monitor ink levels, and even use your mobile camera as a copier source. If you prefer rock-solid stability for a desktop setup, it also includes a standard USB port and an Ethernet jack. Running Costs: Standard vs. XL Cartridges Inkjets live or die by their cartridge costs. The MFC-J5340DW ships with standard starter inks, but it accepts Brother’s LC422XL high-yield cartridges. The XL black cartridge is rated for roughly 3,000 pages. The XL color cartridges are rated for roughly 1,500 pages. If you stick to the XL cartridges, the cost-per-page drops significantly, making it incredibly competitive with budget color laser printers while consuming far less electricity during operation. I have used 3rd party inks with differing results: some are not so good whilst others have been excellent in their performance. The Verdict The Brother MFC-J5340DW is a highly efficient, rugged office or home machine. It successfully bridges the gap between home office compactness and small-business capability. If you need a fast, reliable 4-in-1 machine that handles heavy daily A4 workloads but gives you the flexibility to print A3 poster, photo, or project chart, this is one of the most practical and economical choices on the market. I use this mainly for printing A3 photos for which I prefer the matte finish 230gsm koala paper which is of a good quality and a reasonable price. I have also used it for printing double sided A4 manuals sometimes up to 600 pages and it performed flawlessly. It’s difficult to find any negatives for the price I paid of £148.00 and 5 months interest too made it a no-brainer purchase. Highly recommended 5 stars.

I bought the Brother MFC-J5334ODW printer as a middle ground between a semi-pro home office printer. Just for background: MFC = Multi-Function Centre - An all-in-one device that can print, scan, copy, and fax J = Inkjet technology 5340 = Model number within the series D: Automatic double-sided printing W: Wi-Fi connectivity There's a more expensive 'E' version with comes with a 4 month free 'EcoPro' subscription trial. My key decision factors for buying this were: - Business/Home-Office use - AirPrint connectivity - Dual duplex function for single-pass double-sided scanning - A3 capability for occasional larger format printing and scanning It certainly has a more premium feel as a semi/prosumer home office printer. Design: The styling is sleek and modern, departing from typical boxy black printers. Its predominantly white housing with rounded corners creates a visually lighter presence that complements my home office setup without dominating the desk space. While the construction is indeed plastic (similar to consumer-grade Canon and HP models), this is expected at this price point. The build quality feels appropriate for the market segment, balancing aesthetics with affordability without compromising functionality. But where this Brother printer stands out is that it looks quite appealing in it's cream/white livery with charcoal grey front. Features: The large retractable 2.6 inch touchscreen is a standout feature—practical, bold, and exceptionally clear with intuitive navigation. I appreciate being able to execute common tasks like scanning or printing with just one or two taps, streamlining my workflow considerably. It has a number of clever openings anf backdoors which easily allows you to get inside the printer, change cartridges, remove paper jams etc. Having said that, I've hardly experienced much paper jams with this printer. Just pay attention to loading paper correctly. It has an internal external USB-A slot. It also has Ethernet Port (LAN) Ideal for office use where a stable network connection is needed or to setup a home/office LAN print server. The wi-fi is Wi-Fi (Wireless LAN IEEE 802.11b/g/n). The device connects to your wireless router for network printing/scanning and supports wireless printing from laptops, desktops, and mobile devices. But this does not have Near Field Communication (NFC) or Bluetooth. Ink Cartridge Usage and Printing Quality: The printer comes with supplied cartridges, which is a nice touch. However, in practice, after a couple of months of moderate use (only about 350 printed pages), two colour cartridges ran out. But of course, this is not a gripe, just an expectation - I would say compared to previous printers i've had like Epson, Canon and HP, these ink cartridges last longer. I only print occasionally as I work paperless when possible. The actual product information on Brother's website says it prints 550 pages from a full cartridges. The printer takes four ink cartridges – black, cyan, magenta, and yellow – which come in two types, the standard-sized LC422 cartridge and the bigger LC422XL variety. Brother LC422BK Ink Cartridge – Black: about £24.00 Brother LC422C Ink Cartridge – Cyan: about £17.00 Brother LC422Y Ink Cartridge – Yellow - about £17.00 Brother LC422M Ink Cartridge – Magenta - about £17.00 or: Brother LC422VAL ink cartridge multipack - all colours - about £62 The Clip-in ink cartridges are easy to install via the front loading compartment to thr right of the printer. Borderless printing works very well, and both quality and speed are very good. However, compared to ink tank devices that are now widely available, the cost per page is considerably higher, which is the one drawback of this otherwise excellent device. While the printer's price is really competitive for its quality, like most home consumer/semi-pro printers, be prepared to spend money on new cartridges after a few months of use. Paper Handling: Don’t be misled by reviews stating you can only load A3 paper one sheet at a time. Simply pull out and extend the paper tray as shown in the instructions, and you’ll be able to load an entire ream of A3 paper with ease. It prints a variety of paper types really well—card, glossy paper up to 300 gsm—but you need to load the document feeder carefully, ensuring proper alignment with the roller heads to prevent jams. In essence, treat the printer well—don't just carelessly load reams of paper, or it will get stuck. The Brother MFC-J5330DW can handle a variety of paper weights, and the key figure you're looking for is the maximum supported GSM (grams per square metre). - Standard Tray (Tray 1): Supports: 64 to 220 gsm - Manual Feed Slot: Supports: 64 to 300 gsm So, if you want to print on thicker card stock or photo paper, use the manual feed slot — it can handle up to 300 gsm, which is pretty robust for an office inkjet printer. Connectivity: Stays reliably connected to Wi-Fi.It does not cut out, which is excellent for home office use. I use the internal USB port for direct connection to my desktop computer. The device also Includes a convenient external USB-A port on the front. Performance / Everyday Use: It's very quiet and unassuming, even when printing. In fact it has quite a pleasant muted printing sound - compare that to the irritating screech of inkjet printers of yesteryear. Be warned though, it does sometimes go into an automatic self-clean cycle - this could wake you up at 12am if you so happen to have it in your bedroom, but again, it's very very quiet and muted (almost pleasant in an ASMR kind of way) and not too disturbing at all. Some stats: - Fast printing – A4 at around 28ppm, A3 at around 24ppm - < 1 min for photos on glossy 10x15cm (4x6in) paper - Scans plain text on A4 at 300dpi in under 5 seconds - Passable prints at Normal quality setting Document Handling The auto document feeder (ADF) allows A4 documents to be scanned directly on both sides without having to flip the paper manually. My girlfriend scans around 100 pages per week via the ADF with no problems, even with sticky notes attached. The document feeder is possibly not ideal for A3 on a professional basis (speed-wise) but works fine for home use. My daughter's watercolours can be scanned in A3 at very good quality via the flatbed, which is fantastic. My Son's high megapixel DSLR photography prints come out really well on glossy paper too, but It'll make you cringe at the amount of ink it's using! When I'm particularly in a hurry, I use the Scan directly to email or to my Desktop via the ADF and scan directly from my Mac. Like i say, I bought the printer as a middle ground between a semi-pro home office printer but also as a casual printer that the kids will use frequently, but it sits in my home office so I can control when the cheeky monkeys send 500 print jobs from their upstairs bedroom to the printer in my downstairs office, I can control this with the printer queue management software. SUMMARY All in all, the Brother MFC-J5334ODW does the job well, both functionally and practically. It strikes an excellent balance between professional features and home usability, making it a worthwhile addition to any home or small office environment. Its combination of A3 capability, duplex scanning, wireless connectivity, and appealing design delivers solid performance for everyday printing needs while providing enough advanced features for more demanding tasks when required. No real complaints, so 5 out of 5 for me.

Really like this printer. Quite large and heavy, but seems well made and solid, you would not want to move it about too often. Set-up was quick and easy. prints very quick and quality of print is excellent. Print cartridges are in the mid-price range, and OEM cartridges are reasonably cheap, Printer being dual band Wi-Fi is an absolute bonus. when using fibre broadband. Certainly, an upgrade from my Epson that constantly had connection problems.

Nice printer/scanner/copier and the set up was smooth and straight forward. PCs, Macs and mobiles found it on the wireless network and are printing.

This was very similar to an old Brother Unit that failed after approx. 5 x years - so it had no surprises for me in its operation BUT it was not the easiest thing in the world to set up and for some reason Brothers instructions always seem to complicated, to a Layman - I called in my Computer man

If you do a lot of work, this bad boy will get you through it all. I bet Pam would choose this printer over replacing all the chairs.

The print cartridges supplied haven’t even lasted long enough to make sure the print quality is good! Now had to do 6 checks and still has missing parts on the check. Very disappointed. May have to send this back if it doesn’t resolve very soon.

Printer is working well,after some problems with configuration (hence the delay in posting this). The A3 facility is particularly useful, as is the relatively compact size for a Brother MFC.