If your computer cannot find a wireless printer, it might be due to various reasons:

Here, I’ll demonstrate the exact troubleshooting process I follow when my computer cannot find my wireless printer,Brother MFC-J2720.

General Troubleshooting Steps

These are just the basic troubleshooting steps, though. Let’s go through some advanced fixes to resolve the error.

Restart the Print Spooler Service

The print spooler is a special Windows service thatspools print jobsand handles every printer-related operation on your computer.

Restarting this service often helps to fix a printer thatrefuses to printorkeeps going offline.

Not to mention, it is equally helpful to fix it when your computer is not finding a wireless printer. To do it,

Run the Setup From Installation Media

I’m pretty sure you already triedfinding your wireless printerfrom the Settings and Control Panel. But there’s still another way you may do it. I often use this method and yes,it’s a foolproof method.

Recently, I have been through a similar situation. I tried adding my office printer Brother MFC-J2720 to my computer. But itneither showed up in Settings nor the Control Panel.

As such, I went to Brother’s official site,downloaded the driver setup filefor my model, and installed it.

It found the printer successfully and I was able to print without any issues.

Here I have listed the official websites ofBrother,Canon,Epson,andHPfor your ease.

Check the Network Status of Your Printer

Just because your printer isconnected to the same Wi-Fi networkas your computer, doesn’t necessarily mean that your PC will find it.

Such things mostly happen when there is anIP address conflictbetween your printer and computer. To know if that’s the case, you have tofind the IP address of your printerfirst.

While you may use a range of methods to find it, I suggest youuse the printer’s screenorprint the network configuration page.

Here’s theIP address of my HP printeras seen on the network page. Its192.168.10.224.

Once you grab the IP, compare the IP withyour computer’s IP. The printer’s IPmust be on the same subnetfor your computer to find it.

As you may see, my computer’s IP is192.168.10.88. With subnet255.255.255.0, the printer should have an IP between192.168.10.2and192.168.10.254. And this holds true in my case.

I have often seen my HP printer getting IP on another subnet like192.168.20.124. Sometimes even random IPs like96.194.234.62. That won’t work.

If you have similar kinds of IP conflicts,reconnect your printer to the Wi-Fi networkand see if that brings back the correct IP.

The best bet would be toassign a static IP to your printerand then add it to your computer using the same IP.