HP Smart Tank 5003: Specs, Price, Pros & Cons
This review measures the HP Smart Tank 5003 against the full 24-spec sheet we track for printers, comparing it like for like with the 50 other models in our database. It earns a VS Score of 34 out of 100 — the weighted result of every verified specification measured against the class average.
On the spec sheet it is strongest in connectivity and weakest in scanning & copying. Its clearest single advantage over the class average: a lighter build — 5 kg vs 9.07 kg (avg). Street prices currently start at $ 169.99 for the HP Smart Tank 5003.
Category strengths
Where the HP Smart Tank 5003 beats the average
- Has supertank / refillable ink ?
- Has color printing ?
- A lighter build ?5 kg vs 9.07 kg (avg)
- Has all-in-one ?
- A higher print resolution ?4,800 dpi vs 4,041.94 dpi (avg)
- Has Wi-Fi Direct ?
- Has Apple AirPrint ?
- Has Wi-Fi ?
Where the HP Smart Tank 5003 trails the average
- A lower print speed (black) ?10 ppm vs 17.21 ppm (avg)
- No automatic duplex printing ?
- A much lower print speed (color) ?5 ppm vs 12.51 ppm (avg)
- No automatic document feeder ?
- A much lower input tray capacity ?100 sheets vs 182.02 sheets (avg)
- A much lower monthly duty cycle ?3,000 pages vs 19,346.15 pages (avg)
- No ethernet ?
- No touchscreen display ?
- A much lower output tray capacity ?30 sheets vs 68.95 sheets (avg)
- No duplex scanning ?
Editor’s note
The Smart Tank 5003 is HP's entry ticket out of the cartridge economy, and the arithmetic is the whole story. The refillable tanks are fed by bottles – a 135 ml black rated around 6,000 pages, colours around 8,000 each – that street for ten to thirteen dollars apiece. That lands comfortably under one cent per black page, roughly a fifteenth of what the HP 68 cartridges in the DeskJet line cost per page. A full set of bottles ships in the box, which HP markets as up to three years of ink.
Against that one enormous advantage stands a list of things HP left out to hit the price. There is no automatic duplex – notable on a printer that exists to print volume – no document feeder, no fax, no Ethernet, and the display is a 1.2-inch segment LCD, not a screen. Colour speed is a leisurely 5 ppm ISO, so photo-heavy jobs crawl. The output tray holds 30 sheets against a 100-sheet input.
Two fine-print items are worth knowing. The warranty runs one year or 30,000 pages, whichever comes first – a page-count cap you will not find on the cartridge machines. And first-time setup involves filling four tanks from bottles and priming printheads yourself; it is well-designed but it is not a thirty-second unboxing.
At around $170 it earns a 4.0-star owner score from 100 reviews, the best of HP's current group, and I think deservedly: the buyers it disappoints are mostly those who expected office features. For a household printing a few hundred mostly-black pages a month with no duplex needs, this is the sensible HP. If two-sided printing or an ADF matters, the step to the Smart Tank 7603 – or Epson's ET-2980 – is the real decision.
Specifications
Quality bars are generated automatically against 50 other printers.
Printing
Laser prints crisp text fast; inkjet handles photos and colour better.
Prints in colour, not just black and white.
Black-and-white pages per minute; higher is faster.
Colour pages per minute; higher is faster.
A higher dot density produces sharper prints.
Prints both sides of the page without manual flipping.
Refillable ink tanks cut the cost per page dramatically.
The maximum recommended pages per month.
Scanning & copying
Scans and copies as well as prints.
Feeds multi-page documents through the scanner unattended.
How many pages the document feeder holds at once.
Scans both sides of a page automatically.
Sends and receives faxes.
Paper handling
A larger tray needs refilling less often.
How many printed pages the output tray holds.
The largest paper format supported (e.g. Letter, Legal, A3).
Connectivity
Print wirelessly over the home network.
Connect devices directly without a router.
A wired network port for reliable office use.
A direct USB connection to a computer.
Print from iPhone, iPad and Mac without extra drivers.
Print and manage the printer from a phone app.
Design
An onboard touchscreen makes standalone tasks easier.
A lighter printer is easier to place and move.
How the VS Score works — and what it can’t tell you
Every measurable spec is scored against the average of all the printers we track: matching the class average scores 50, clearly beating it climbs towards 100, and each spec counts according to an editorial weight that reflects real-world impact — a battery-capacity gap moves the score far more than a colour-options list. The quality bars on the spec cards above show where this model sits inside the full range for its class, and the overall VS Score rolls every weighted result into one number.
Unknown values are never estimated. A spec this product doesn’t report simply drops out of its scoring — it isn’t penalised with a guess — but a thinner spec sheet does mean a score built on fewer data points, which is why completeness is disclosed under About this data.
Most importantly: a spec-sheet lead is not the same as a better product. Megapixels, gigahertz and benchmark points describe capacity, not experience — image processing, software optimisation, thermals, haptics and ergonomics decide how a device actually feels, and no table captures reliability or long-term support quality. Treat the VS Score as a structured summary of what can be measured, not a substitute for your own priorities.
About this data
- Specifications are compiled from each manufacturer’s official spec sheet, cross-checked against trusted specification databases, and normalised into one schema so identical things are compared identically.
- Specifications last verified August 19, 2026.
- Data completeness: 23 of the 24 specs in this category are verified (96%). Anything we could not verify is shown as Unknown — never estimated — and is excluded from the score.
- Prices and availability come from live retailer feeds via our shopping partners and refresh throughout the day; a missing price means no partner currently lists the product, not that it is discontinued.
- Want the full picture? Our editorial guidelines explain how we research products, weight the scores and stay independent.
- Spotted an error in a spec? Tell us and we will correct the sheet.
Where to buy
Prices and availability may change. Check the retailer before buying. We may earn a commission on purchases.
Price history
Printers with similar specs to the HP Smart Tank 5003
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The bottom line
The HP Smart Tank 5003 earns a VS Score of 34, trailing most of the 51 printers we compare here, at least on the spec sheet.
- Who it’s for
- A household printing a few hundred mostly-black, single-sided pages a month that wants ink costs to simply stop being a topic.
- Who should look elsewhere
- Small offices – no duplex, no ADF, no Ethernet and 5 ppm colour rule out real document workflows, and the warranty caps at 30,000 pages.
- The trade-off that matters
- Sub-cent pages in exchange for a feature list thinner than $170 suggests – HP kept the tank and cut everything around it.
- The main alternative
- Epson EcoTank ET-2980 costs more but adds auto-duplex printing, the one feature this machine's target buyer most often ends up missing.
The VS Score is generated automatically from the weighted specifications above, measured against all other printers in our database. Treat it as a shortlisting guide — not a substitute for your own priorities.
