Epson WorkForce Pro WF-3733 All-in-One Printer Review

Exclusive to Target and Walmart, Epson's WorkForce Pro WF-3733 ($179.99) is an all-in-one printer intended for low- to medium-volume printing and copying in small offices or workgroups.

Like all PrecisionCore-based Epson WorkForce Pro machines, the WF-3733 is relatively quick, and it prints well.

It also comes out of the box with a respectable paper capacity.

As with many borderline entry-level/midrange office-oriented AIOs, though, it has somewhat high running costs.

Otherwise, like most of its WorkForce Pro AIO siblings, the WF-3733 is more than capable of light- to medium-duty service in settings with up to a handful of users.

No New Tricks

Before going over the design features of the WF-3733, I should note that Epson also makes an identical WF-3730 iteration of this machine for distribution through Staples and Office Depot.

Both versions measure 13 by 16.7 by 19.8 inches (HWD) and weigh close to 25 pounds, and they are, aside from a slightly lower list price and a few minor tweaks, very similar to 2017's Epson WorkForce Pro WF-4730—right down to its 2.7-inch color touch screen LCD control panel, shown here.

A competing AIO, HP's similarly priced and configured OfficeJet Pro 8216 is, with its trays closed, close in size and weight.

On the other hand, Brother's two-paper-drawer AIO, the MFC-J5945DW ($496.52 at Amazon) , is a few inches bigger all around and weighs almost twice as much as the WF-3733, but then the former can print tabloid-size (11-by-17-inch) pages and has more prodigious specs and ratings.

One of the casualties of the WF-3733's bargain pricing is that, while it does have an automatic document feeder (ADF), its 35-page capacity is lower that many of its competitors.

It also supports only manual duplexing, whereas both the MFC-J5945DW and the OfficeJet Pro 8216 ( at Amazon) deploy the more efficient single-pass auto-duplexing method.

Epson rates the WF-3733's maximum monthly duty cycle at 15,000 pages, and its recommended monthly print volume is 10 percent of that.

That duty cycle falls 15,000 pages short of the maximum rating for both the WorkForce Pro WF-4730 ($246.80 at Amazon) and the HP 8216, though their recommended volumes are the same.

The MFC-J5945DW's duty cycle is also 30K, but its recommended monthly print and copy amounts are 500 pages greater than these other three AIOs.

Business-Ready Connectivity

As inexpensive as the WorkForce Pro WF-3733 is, it's still an office printer, and therefore requires business-level connectivity and workflow automation features.

Starting with the standard interfaces, you get Ethernet, USB 2.0 (for connecting to a single PC), Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi Direct, and near-field communication (NFC).

Wi-Fi Direct and NFC are peer-to-peer networking protocols that allow you to connect your mobile devices to the printer without either them or it being connected to an intermediary network or router.

NFC is a touch-to-print protocol that allows you to connect your smartphone (or tablet) to the printer by tapping it to a hotspot on the printer.

In this case, you'll find the NFC hotspot to the left of the control panel, a small "N" outlined in red, shown below.

You can also print from and scan to USB memory drives.

Other mobile connectivity features are Apple AirPrint, Google Cloud Print, Mopria, and a series of both Android and iOS apps—Epson Scan To, Epson Email Print, Epson iPrint, Epson Remote Print, and Creative Print App that Epson calls Epson Connect.

Also configurable from the control panel or via the WF-3733's built-in web server is a series of one-touch workflow profiles.

They are: Scan to Cloud, Scan to Email (SSL), Scan to Flash Drive, Scan to Network Folder, Scan to PC, Scan to PDF, Density Adjustments, and Remove Shadows.

Keeping Up With the Competition

Epson rates the WF-3733 at 20 pages per minute (ppm) for black pages and 10ppm for color, which is average for a lower-end WorkForce Pro AIO.

I tested it over Ethernet on our standard Intel Core i5-equipped testbed PC running Windows 10 Professional, and it churned out the first portion of our test regimen, a 12-page Microsoft Word text document, at a rate of 22ppm, or 4.6ppm ahead of the HP 8216 and 2ppm quicker than the Brother MFC-J5945DW.

See How We Test Printers

For phase two of the test sequences, I timed the WF-3733 as it printed several intricate color Acrobat, Excel, and PowerPoint marketing documents and presentation handouts containing large charts, graphs, and other full-page business graphics.

Then, I combined those results with those from the previous 12-page text document test and came up with a comprehensive score of 15.5ppm for printing our entire suite of test documents.

Here, the WF-3733's score placed it ahead of the MFC-J5945DW by just more than 10ppm and ahead of the OfficeJet 8216 by even more—a whopping 11.5ppm.

Finally, while this is not a photo printer, I timed it as it churned out our highly detailed and vibrantly colored test 4-by-6-inch snapshots.

Here, it managed an average of 22 seconds and a little longer than that when I applied the borderless output option.

Less than half-a-minute for reproducing our test snapshots isn't bad at all.

Without going into a full-blown dissertation on the benefits of Epson's PrecisionCore technology, I will say that the printheads in WorkForce and WorkForce Pro printers contain more, smaller, and more concisely arranged ink nozzles than most other inkjet printers.

The results are cleaner, near-laser quality text, tighter dot patterns, and more detailed graphics and photos.

The WF-3733's well-shaped and highly legible text, accurately colored and rendered business graphics, and above-par photos continue this tradition of producing better-than-acceptable output.

Also, the WF-3733 supports borderless printing up to letter-size, and can churn out envelopes as well.

Typical Running Costs

While the WF-3733, with its 500-sheet paper input capacity and 1,500-page recommended monthly print volume, is decked out to print a lot of pages, its per-page cost of ink suggests otherwise.

When you buy Epson's highest-yield ink cartridges for this AIO, black pages will cost you about 3.6 cents per page and color pages run about 11.7 cents each.

These numbers are not unheard of for business-oriented AIOs in this price range, but nowadays you have many alternatives.

The Editors' Choice Epson WorkForce Pro WF-C5790, a sort of EcoTank hybrid that uses aluminum bags rather than cartridges or bottles, has running costs of 1.7 cents for black pages and 7.7 cents for color.

It costs $120 more up front, but depending on how much you print, you could end up saving in the long term.

The Brother MFC-J5945DW is one of that company's INKvestment Tank AIOs, and it delivers running costs of about 1 cent for black pages and about 5 cents per color page.

HP's OfficeJet Pro 8216 is eligible for that company's Instant Ink subscription program, which, when you opt for the highest subscription plan ($19.95 monthly for 700 pages), each page—no matter whether it's black or full-color and regardless of the percentage of coverage—costs 2.9 cents per page.

Mismatched Capacity and Running Costs

If you're shopping for the best-priced printer, it's safe to assume that the ongoing cost of using it is also an important consideration.

Unfortunately, despite the WorkForce Pro WF-3733's spacious paper trays and relatively high volume ratings, it's lopsided running costs render it a low-volume AIO.

Otherwise, the WF-3733 is a decent choice for offices that benefit from having easy access to two different media types and don't need to scan a lot of two-sided multipage documents.

If your office does have a higher print volume, it's worth checking out an AIO with lower running costs, like the Editors' Choice WorkForce Pro WF-C5790 ($284.14 at Amazon) .

It will cost you $120 more up front, but, depending on how much you print, could save you cash in the long term.