Getting a document in Word to print out exactly how you want can be extremely confusing and challenging. Personally, I have always seen how the process can take a couple of times to get right, and it can be pretty exhausting at the end of the day. One common issue is having double-sided or duplex printing in your printing commands.
If you want to switch off duplex or double-sided printing in Word, you can change the printing settings in the Print Options tab at the top of the toolbar. This will switch off duplex printing for one print job. On the other hand, you can also switch it off permanently through the device settings in the Control Panel.
Are you reading to learn how to switch off duplex printing? Keep reading our article about how you can do it in different circumstances and the benefits of choosing this option!
Switching Off Double-Sided Printing
Double-sided or duplex printing is a type of printing process that allows you to get printed items on either side of one page. This kind of printing is extremely effective in certain situations – for example when printing a book or a newsletter. However, if you just have a one-page document, this can lead to printing on both sides, which is unnecessary and can use a lot of ink. So, how can you solve this problem? We’ve found two ways to do this, either directly from Word, through printer preferences, or through the Control Panel.
Using MS Word
When you are using Microsoft’s Word application, there is an option to give printing commands. Aside from basic commands, you can also use this functionality to select or deselect specific advanced settings such as the duplex printing option. Here’s how you can do this:
- Open the file you want to print in the MS Word software.
- Find ‘File’ at the top of the toolbar in the software.
- Once you click the tab, a menu will open up.
- Choose the Print option from this menu.
- You will be taken to another window, where you can look for the heading ‘Pages.’
- There’s a drop-down menu under this. Select ‘Print One-Sided’ from this menu.
Now, the printer will be instructed to print one-sided, but this setting will not retain across other printing commands. You will have to disable this printing style every single time.
Related: How To Fix Canon Printer Printing Black Pages
Permanently Prevent Duplex Printing
As mentioned above, changing the printing options in MS Word is not a permanent feature. Instead, every single time you give a new command, you will have to change the settings again to reflect what you need. This can get quite frustrating and repetitive. However, there is a way to solve this problem with the use of permanent prevention mechanisms. While this is a generally straightforward process, you may have to do some looking around to find the right options inside the system of your printer. However, here is a guideline on how to prevent your printer from printing out double-sided papers:
- Switch on the computer you intend to run the printing action from.
- Click on the windows symbol on the left-most side of the taskbar.
- This will open up a search box. From here, look for and open up the Control Panel.
- When the window for the Control Panel opens up, click on the option ‘Hardware and Sound.’
- On the next page, select the option ‘Devices and Printers.’
- You will be taken to the page for Printers. Now, in the list of devices, choose the name of the printer.
- Right-click the name of your printer, and then a menu will open there.
- From the options, select the option ‘Printer Properties.’
- Now, choose the option ‘Device Settings.’ Next, find the option ‘Two-Sided Printing.’
- Disable this option and switch it off in the drop-down list.
- Save your settings by clicking the ‘Ok’ button.
As a result of this, your printer will no longer show the option for double-sided printing. The only downside of this process is that if you need to use double-sided printing, you will now need to change the setting for your printer again.
The Benefits Of Using Single-Sided Printing
After the entire ordeal of switching off duplex printing, you might want to think about the advantages of not having this printing style. The duplex printing style is a complicated process where the printer creates one side of the page and then comes back to the same piece of paper and prints on the other side of it. In most cases, it is on by default as a mechanism to help you not waste too much paper. That does not mean, however that duplex printing is always best-suited to what you need.
When You Need To Distribute Papers
For example, the level of productivity and cost prevention does not matter if you need single-sided pages that you need to distribute amongst people. Sure, printing on both sides is efficient, but it isn’t practical, as you cannot expect people to share the same piece of paper and use both sides of it at once.
Therefore, duplex printing may not be the most suitable approach when there are other people involved. If you need to create leaflets, for example, there is no point in printing the same information on the back. In fact, this may be a waste of your ink and resources as much as a waste of time.
When Trying To Print Images
In most cases, when there are photos being printed, it is usual to want them on one side only. This is because that makes the photos accessible, and it’s easy to avoid the issue of seeing bleeding through the paper on the other side. You will also only want the photo on one side if you plan on sticking it somewhere, in which case a duplex printing style doesn’t necessarily work in the best possible way.
Conclusion
Whether or not you opt for the permanent solution, you now know how to switch off duplex printing when using Word. We hope this article helped you print in the right way!