Printing documents and images directly from your phone make your life a lot easier because you do not need to turn on your PC, connect your phone to the PC via a USB data cable to print images, emails, and documents stored on your phone.

How to Print Directly from Android Phone via USB Cable

  1. If your phone does not detect your printer, then you need to install PrinterShare Mobile Print app from Play Store. It installs a virtual printer in your phone that you can access via phone Settings -> Printing -> PrintShare. Select and enable it by flipping the on-off switch.
  2. Now, connect your printer to your phone via an USB OTG cable, then open the PrintShare app, tap ‘Select’ button and then choose ‘Nearby-USB’ option. Your phone should detect your printer.
  3. Once your printer is detected, you will be asked to download the appropriate drivers. Confirm it and it takes only a fraction of a second. After this, your Android device is ready to print documents and pictures to your USB OTG connected printer. Note: The free version of PrintShare app does not allow you to print via USB cable. You need a premium key to do so.

Other Method to Connect Printer to Android Phone (Using Google Cloud Print)

If you own a Wi-Fi enabled printer, it easy to print from your phone, but if you don’t own such a printer, there is an alternative method to connect your printer to your Android phone. The Google Cloud Print service is the best alternative method to connect your ordinary printer to Android, but it required a computer.

Open Chrome browser on your PC > choose Settings > and expand the Advanced section.Click Printing > click on Google Cloud Print > and sign in with your Google account (linked to your Android phone).Now, choose Mange Cloud Print device and click on Add printer button.Connect printer to your PC and turn on it.Follow the instruction to add the printer.Now, install Google Cloud Print app from Play Store (link), if you don’t have it already on your phone.Now, when you print from your phone, select Cloud Print.

So, this is the easiest method to connect your Android phone to an ordinary printer. If you know any other way to print from your phone, let us know in the comment.

More on the topic:

Digitize your old photo prints using Google PhotoScan appHow to copy text from paper on your phone and paste it on your PCHow to hide photos and videos in Google Photos