Rollo USB label printer review
Under $250, one label per second, and a volume floor below which it never pays.
A direct thermal 4 by 6 label printer connecting over USB, printing at one label per second with no ink or toner and support for every major shipping platform.
Check price on AmazonSpecifications
| Spec | Detail |
|---|---|
| Print technology | Direct thermal, no ink or toner |
| Resolution | 203 dpi print head |
| Speed | 150 mm/s, about one 4x6 label per second |
| Label width range | 1.57 in. to 4.1 in. |
| Connection | USB |
| Operating systems | Windows XP and newer, Mac 10.9 and newer |
| Carriers | FedEx, UPS and USPS |
| Platforms | Amazon, Shopify, Etsy, eBay, ShipStation, ShippingEasy, Shippo, ShipWorks and others |
| Included app | Rollo Ship with access to its own shipping rates |
Specifications above come from Rollo's published product information. Treat pricing as approximate, since Amazon pricing moves.
What it does well
- One label per second is fast enough that printing stops being a step you think about. A batch of the morning's orders prints while you are still finding the first parcel.
- No ink, ever. Direct thermal removes cartridges and toner from your cost base permanently, and over a year that is a real saving against printing labels on a normal printer.
- The label width range from 1.57 to 4.1 inches means it is not only a shipping label printer. Product labels, barcodes, thank-you stickers and QR codes all come off the same machine.
- It works with essentially every platform sellers actually use, and it does so directly rather than through a workaround involving PDFs and manual resizing.
- At under $250 it is roughly a third of the price of the DYMO 4XL for the same core function, which is the single most persuasive fact about it.
Where it falls short
- It is USB only. There is no wifi and no Bluetooth, so it must be tethered to a computer and you cannot print a label from your phone. If your fulfilment happens on a phone, this is the wrong model.
- 203 dpi is lower resolution than the DYMO 4XL's 300 dpi. In practice most carrier barcodes scan fine, but if you are already having scan failures, that difference is the reason to spend more.
- Direct thermal labels fade with heat, sunlight and abrasion. Fine for a parcel in transit, poor for inventory labels that must stay legible on a box in a warm garage for a year.
- It only prints; it does not weigh. Guessed parcel weights cost more in carrier adjustments over a year than a scale costs, so a scale is the companion purchase.
- Below roughly a parcel a day the arithmetic simply does not work. Adhesive label sheets and the printer you already own are the honest recommendation at low volume, and no feature on this machine changes that.
What owners report
Sellers consistently describe the Rollo as the purchase they should have made sooner, and the recurring specific is speed: batches that used to take fifteen minutes of printing, cutting and taping become a couple of minutes of peeling. Reliability over long periods draws steady praise, with owners reporting years of daily use.
The consistent complaints are the USB-only connection and setup on newer operating systems, where driver installation is described as more fiddly than it should be. Label quality varies noticeably between third-party rolls, and owners who report print problems frequently trace them to cheap labels rather than to the printer.
The honest way to decide is arithmetic, not features. Put your monthly order count, your shipping cost per item and your time per item into our Etsy shop revenue calculator, and if you sell on Amazon, run the same numbers through the Amazon FBA profit calculator. If the monthly saving does not repay the price inside a year, do not buy it yet.
Who it suits
- Etsy, eBay and Shopify sellers shipping roughly a parcel a day or more from home.
- Anyone currently printing labels on regular paper and taping them to parcels, which is the workflow this replaces.
- Sellers who also want product, barcode and thank-you labels from the same machine.
- Anyone whose fulfilment happens at a computer rather than on a phone.
Who should skip it
- Very low volume sellers, where the payback never arrives and adhesive label sheets are correct.
- Anyone who needs to print from a phone or tablet, which the USB-only model cannot do.
- Sellers already having barcode scan failures, where the DYMO 4XL's 300 dpi is the direct fix.
- Anyone needing labels that stay legible for years, since direct thermal fades.
Alternatives worth considering
Roughly two and a half times the price for 300 dpi instead of 203 and a deeper software ecosystem. Worth it specifically if barcode scan reliability is a problem you are actually having, or if you print a lot of non-shipping labels. Otherwise the Rollo does the same job.
Check price on AmazonConsiderably cheaper and it prints over Bluetooth from a phone, which the Rollo cannot. Build quality and support are not at the same level and heavy daily use is not its intent, but if your fulfilment happens on a phone or your volume is low, it removes the payback problem entirely.
Check price on AmazonCommon questions
How many orders per month do you need for a label printer to pay for itself?
Do the sum with your own numbers. Multiply the minutes you currently spend per order on printing, cutting and taping by your monthly orders, value that time at what you would otherwise earn, and add the ink and adhesive-sheet cost you stop paying. Divide the price by that monthly figure. If the answer is more than twelve months, the honest advice is not yet. Our Etsy shop revenue calculator has fields for shipping cost and time per item, which is precisely the input this calculation needs.
Rollo or DYMO 4XL: which is better value?
The Rollo, for most sellers, because it does the same core job for around a third of the price. The DYMO earns its premium at 300 dpi if barcode scanning is genuinely failing for you, and through deeper label software if you print more than shipping labels. We put them head to head in our Rollo vs DYMO 4XL comparison.
Does the Rollo USB print wirelessly from a phone?
No. This model connects over USB to a Windows or Mac computer only. Rollo makes wireless models and other manufacturers offer Bluetooth printers, so if phone-based fulfilment is how you work, buy one of those instead. Discovering this after purchase is the most common complaint about this particular model.
Do you need special labels for a Rollo printer?
It uses standard 4 by 6 direct thermal labels, in fanfold stacks or rolls, and it is not locked to a proprietary consumable. Label quality does vary noticeably between suppliers, and most print quality complaints trace back to cheap rolls rather than to the printer. Buy decent labels and price a year of them into the purchase decision.
What else do I need to ship efficiently from home?
A scale, above all. Guessed weights generate carrier adjustment charges that quietly cost more over a year than the scale does, and our shipping scale vs kitchen scale comparison covers whether the one in your kitchen will do. After that, the packaging decision matters for both cost and dimensional weight, which we cover in poly mailers vs shipping boxes.
Keep reading
- Rollo vs DYMO 4XL compared
- Etsy shop revenue calculator
- Shipping scale vs kitchen scale
- Poly mailers vs shipping boxes
- DYMO LabelWriter 4XL review
This review draws on published specifications, manufacturer figures and the consensus of verified owner reviews. We have not tested this product ourselves, and we say so rather than implying otherwise. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.