How to fax from printer depends on whether a telephone line is plugged into the printer. A multifunction printer with a fax function and a live phone line faxes like a machine: load the pages, dial, send. Without a line, the printer cannot fax, but it can scan the pages to a computer or a phone that sends them through an online service, and it can print what an online service receives. This page covers both, so that can you fax from a printer is answered for the printer you actually have.
How to send a fax from printer with a phone line
Connect the line to the printer's line port, not the extension port. Run the fax setup in the printer's menu and enter your fax number and name so the header on outgoing pages is right. Load the pages in the document feeder face up or down as the feeder's icon shows. Press fax, dial the number with the area code, and start. The printer negotiates with the receiving machine, sends the pages and prints or displays a confirmation. That is how to fax with printer hardware, and its limits are the line's: one call at a time, no fax when the line is in use for voice, and a header that is wrong until it is set.
Can i fax from my printer with no phone line
Not through the fax function, which needs a line. What works instead: scan the pages on the printer to a PDF, or to email, then send that PDF through an online fax service from a browser or by email to the number at the vendor's domain. The vendor's lines place the fax call and return the report. How to fax on printer hardware that has a scanner and Wi-Fi but no line is therefore scan, then send online. Some vendors publish a print driver so that print to fax appears as a printer choice on the computer, which sends the document straight to the service; that is the closest thing to faxing from the printer without a line.
Print and fax from an online account, both directions
Inbound faxes to an online number arrive as PDFs, and the printer prints them like any document, which is how an office keeps a paper copy of a received fax with no fax line. Outbound, the printer's scanner produces the PDF and the service sends it. The printer stays a printer and scanner, the phone line is never ordered, and the fax number is the one on the account, answered around the clock by the vendor. Plans with a number included start at Fax.Plus's printed $6.99 a month with 200 pages, CocoFax $9.99, MetroFax $11.95, iFax $12.49 and WestFax $14.99 with 500 pages, and an existing line's number can be ported in.
Questions people ask about how to fax from printer
Why does my printer say no dial tone?
No phone line is connected to the line port, or it is a digital line the printer cannot use. Connect an analogue line or send through an online service instead.
Can a printer fax over the internet?
Not on its own. It can scan to a PDF that an online service faxes, and some vendors offer a print-to-fax driver on the computer.
Do I need a separate line for the printer's fax?
A shared voice line works with manual answering or a fax switch; a dedicated line is simpler. An online number needs no line at all.