Printer Not Printing After a Windows 11 Update: How to Fix It (2026)

When a Windows 11 update stops a printer working, the usual cause is a driver change rather than a broken printer. Windows now prefers its own driverless stack, so a vendor driver you relied on may have been replaced or bypassed, and the queue can end up bound to something that cannot do everything the old one did. Start by proving the printer still prints at all, then decide whether you need the vendor driver back.

Quick fixes first

1. Power the printer off at the wall for 60 seconds and restart the PC. This alone clears a surprising share of post-update failures.
2. Press Win+R, run services.msc, right-click Print Spooler and choose Restart.
3. Open Settings › Bluetooth & devices › Printers & scanners, click the printer, open the queue and cancel every job.
4. Check the printer is still the default and that you have not gained a second copy of it in the list.
5. Run the printer troubleshooter from Settings › System › Troubleshoot › Other troubleshooters › Printer.
6. Print a Windows test page from Printer properties › General › Print test page.

What changed in Windows 11

Microsoft has been moving printing away from vendor drivers for several years. The modern path is driverless: Windows talks to the printer using IPP and Mopria, negotiates capabilities directly with the device, and does not need a downloaded driver at all. From July 2026, Windows 11 defaults new printer installs to this stack, branded Windows Ready Print. Older material calls the same thing the IPP Class Driver.

For most people this is an improvement: no more driver packages that break at every major release, and no vendor tray software running in the background. The trade-offs are real though:

• Feature loss. Automatic duplex, specific paper trays, stapling and booklet finishing, and vendor colour management may not appear in the print dialog.
• Scanning. Driverless printing does not automatically give you the vendor scan application. Windows Scan and WIA usually still work, but vendor-only scan features such as multi-page ADF profiles may not.
• Old printers. Models that predate IPP Everywhere support are not covered and still need a vendor driver.

Separately, an update can leave the queue pointing at a driver that no longer exists, which shows up as jobs that sit in the queue, disappear without printing, or return "driver is unavailable".

Fix 1: Prove whether anything prints

Before changing drivers, establish the failure mode.

• Nothing prints from anywhere, printer shows offline: treat it as a connection problem first. See fix printer offline on Windows.
• Jobs queue and never move: spooler or driver. Continue with Fix 2.
• Prints from one app but not another: the app, not the printer. Try printing to PDF from the failing app to confirm.
• Prints fine but options are missing: you are on driverless. Go to Fix 4.
• Says "driver is unavailable": go straight to Fix 3, and see our driver is unavailable guide.

Fix 2: Reset the spooler and the queue

1. Press Win+R, type services.msc and press Enter.
2. Right-click Print Spooler and choose Stop.
3. Open C:\Windows\System32\spool\PRINTERS in File Explorer and delete everything inside it.
4. Right-click Print Spooler and choose Start.
5. Set the service Startup type to Automatic if it is not already.
6. Print a test page.

If the spooler stops on its own again within minutes, a driver is crashing it. Move to Fix 3 and remove the old driver package.

Fix 3: Remove the broken driver and reinstall

1. Open Settings › Bluetooth & devices › Printers & scanners and remove every entry for the printer, including duplicates.
2. Press Win+R and run printmanagement.msc.
3. Expand Print Servers › your PC › Drivers, right-click the driver for that model, choose Delete, then Remove driver package.
4. Restart the PC.
5. Add the printer again from Add device and let Windows install it driverless. Print a test page.

If Windows will not remove the driver, stop the Print Spooler, repeat the removal, then start the service again. Our Windows 11 driver guide covers every install route including Windows Update optional drivers and ARM devices.

Fix 4: Get duplex, trays and scanning back

If the printer works but the print dialog has lost options, the queue is running driverless and the model needs its vendor driver to expose those features.

1. Download the full driver and software package for your exact model from the manufacturer's support site. Take the Windows 11 64-bit build, or the ARM64 build on a Snapdragon machine if one is offered.
2. Remove the existing printer queue first, so the installer creates a fresh one rather than reusing the driverless queue.
3. Install, restart, then check Printer properties › Device Settings so Windows knows about the duplexer and extra trays.
4. Set duplex as the default in Printing preferences so it applies to every app.

If duplex still will not work, our double-sided printing guide covers the app-level settings that override the driver. For scanning, install the vendor scan application: HP's app, Epson ScanSmart, Canon IJ Scan Utility or Brother iPrint and Scan. Scanner faults after an update are covered in scanner not working.

Fix 5: Roll back the update

Treat this as temporary. The update returns unless you pause it, and staying on an old build leaves security fixes uninstalled.

1. Open Settings › Windows Update › Update history.
2. Scroll to the bottom and click Uninstall updates.
3. Select the most recent quality update and choose Uninstall.
4. Restart, then in Settings › Windows Update use Pause updates to stop it reinstalling immediately.
5. Use the pause window to install the correct vendor driver, then resume updates.

If the problem followed a feature update rather than a monthly one, Windows offers Settings › System › Recovery › Go back for a limited period after the upgrade. That window is short, so decide quickly.

Brand notes

HP

Run HP Print and Scan Doctor after an update; it detects a queue bound to a missing driver and offers to rebuild it. If the printer was set up through the HP app, sign in again after a feature update, since the account link occasionally needs re-authorising.

Canon

Canon PIXMA models print well driverless, but borderless photo sizes and some media types only appear with the Canon driver. Install the full package if you print photos.

Epson

Epson's full driver brings Status Monitor, which is the only reliable way to see real ink and maintenance-box status on Windows. Driverless queues show generic status only.

Brother

Brother's full driver and software package restores the ADF scan profiles, PC-Fax and secure print options that the driverless queue does not expose. Brother lasers otherwise run well on Windows Ready Print.

Symptom to fix

If nothing worked

Test the printer from a phone on the same Wi-Fi or from a second computer. If it prints from those, the printer and the network are fine and the fault is confined to this PC, which means a clean driver removal and reinstall, or a new Windows user profile to test whether the problem follows your account. If it prints from nothing, go back to the printer itself and our printer not printing guide.

Paying for a hardware repair after a Windows update is almost never the right move; a bench assessment costs roughly 60 to 120 US dollars, 50 to 100 pounds, 90 to 150 Canadian dollars or 100 to 180 Australian dollars and will usually confirm the hardware is fine. If you would rather not work through driver removal and reinstallation yourself, you can get help from a printer specialist to rebuild the print stack remotely.