Lexmark Printer Showing an Error State? Start Here

You send a document to print, and instead of the job starting, Windows or your Mac flags the printer as being in an error state. The printer looks fine, the lights aren't flashing anything obvious, and yet nothing will print. Before you unplug anything, it helps to know that "error state" isn't a specific fault; it's your computer telling you it asked the printer a question and didn't like the answer it got back. Once you know that, tracking down the real cause takes a few minutes, not a few hours.

Why This Happens

"Error state" and "offline" get used interchangeably, but they mean different things. Offline means your computer can't reach the printer at all. Error state means your computer did reach it, and the printer either reported a fault or failed to answer a status check properly. That's an important difference, because it points you toward the printer itself first, not just the network.

The most common triggers are:

• A physical issue on the printer – an open cover or tray, a paper jam, an empty paper tray, or a cartridge that's missing, mis-seated, or not recognized
• A stuck or corrupted job at the front of the queue – one bad file can hold every job behind it hostage (if this sounds like your issue specifically, see our guide to a Lexmark printer job stuck in queue)
• A hung Print Spooler service – the Windows background process that manages every print job on your PC
• An outdated or corrupted driver, often after a Windows or macOS update
• A port setting called SNMP status monitoring, which on some networks misreads a healthy printer as faulty

If your printer's own display is showing a specific code or blinking light pattern rather than just sitting idle, that's a separate issue with a separate fix; check our Lexmark printer code errors and messages guide for that.

Check the Printer Itself First

Because an error state usually means the printer talked back, start at the printer, not the computer.

• Open and firmly reclose every cover and door, including the rear access panel. A cover that isn't fully latched will block printing even if it looks closed.
• Pull out the paper tray, square up the stack, and reseat the tray until it clicks fully into place.
• Check for a torn or crumpled sheet caught in the path, especially near the rollers.
• Remove the toner or ink cartridge, confirm any shipping tape or protective seal is off, and reseat it until it locks in.
• Look at the control panel for a code or a specific message rather than a generic idle screen.

If any of these were the problem, the error typically clears within a few seconds of the fix, before you touch your computer at all.

Windows Fixes

If the printer itself checks out clean, work through these in order.

1. Cancel the stuck job. Go to Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Printers & scanners, select your Lexmark printer, and choose Open print queue. Right-click every job listed, including the one at the top, and select Cancel.
2. Restart the Print Spooler. Press Windows key + R, type services.msc, and press Enter. Scroll to Print Spooler, right-click it, and choose Restart.
3. Turn off SNMP status monitoring. Open Printer Properties > Ports, select the active port, and click Configure Port. Uncheck SNMP Status Enabled and click OK. This single setting is a known cause of a healthy printer being flagged as faulty on some networks.
4. Update or reinstall the driver. Remove the printer under Printers & scanners, download the current driver for your exact model from Lexmark's official support and downloads page, install it, then send a test page.
5. Remove and re-add the printer. If the error flag still won't clear, deleting the printer entry entirely and adding it back fresh drops any bad status Windows has cached for it.

Mac Fixes

1. Open System Settings > Printers & Scanners, select your Lexmark printer, and click Open Print Queue. Control-click any job and choose Cancel.
2. Turn the printer off, unplug it for about 30 seconds, plug it back in, and restart your Mac.
3. Download the current macOS driver from Lexmark's official support site, install it, then remove and re-add the printer using the minus and plus buttons in Printers & Scanners.
4. As a last resort, Control-click anywhere in the printer list and choose Reset printing system, then add the printer back from scratch.

When It's Actually a Hardware Problem

If the physical checks came back clean and the error returns within seconds of every restart, you're likely looking at a worn part rather than a software glitch. Feed rollers that have lost their grip, a fuser nearing the end of its rated life, or a maintenance kit that's past its page count can all make a laser printer intermittently report a fault under normal use.

In that case, more resets won't fix it. It's worth having the printer looked at rather than repeating the same steps expecting a different result.

Prevention Tips

• Let one print job finish before sending the next; queuing several large jobs at once is a common way to trigger a stuck-job error.
• Keep the driver current, especially right after a major Windows or macOS update.
• Use genuine or fully compatible cartridges; chips that the printer can't read reliably cause "cartridge error" style faults.
• Don't leave SNMP status monitoring on if you've already had to disable it once; it tends to re-trigger on the same network setup.