How to Print WooCommerce Orders to Any Printer Automatically (Free Plugin)

Manually printing WooCommerce orders is one of those tasks that works fine until it does not. When you are getting a handful of orders a day, it feels manageable. But once volume picks up, or someone forgets to check the dashboard, or a night shift ends without anyone looking at the orders queue, the cracks start to show.

The fix is straightforward: automate it. When an order is placed and payment is confirmed, it prints. No login required. No one has to remember. No orders slip through.

This guide walks you through exactly how to set that up, using a free plugin that works with virtually any printer.

Why Manual Order Printing Breaks Down

When you rely on someone to manually print each order, you are introducing a dependency that does not need to exist. Every order requires a person to:

1. Notice the order notification

2. Log in to WordPress

3. Navigate to the order

4. Select the correct printer

5. Click print

6. Confirm the document came out correctly

On a slow day, this is fine. On a busy day, or when staff are occupied with other tasks, things get missed. Orders are delayed. Packing slips are not ready when they need to be. Customers wait longer than they should.

The deeper problem is that manual printing does not get more reliable as your store grows. It gets less reliable, because the volume increases while human attention stays the same.

Automation removes this entirely. The print job fires the moment the order qualifies, every time, including overnight and on weekends.

What Automatic Order Printing Actually Means

“Automatic order printing” means that a print job is triggered by an event in your WooCommerce store, not by a person clicking a button.

You configure it once:

• Which order status triggers the print (for example, “Processing” when payment is confirmed)

• Which document type to print (receipt, invoice, packing slip, label)

• Which printer to send it to

After that, every qualifying order prints automatically. The printer in your kitchen, warehouse, or back office receives the job within seconds of the trigger firing.

The Free Stack: Printus + PrintNode

There are several paid solutions for automatic WooCommerce order printing, some charging monthly fees just to access core functionality. But you can achieve the same result for free using two tools:

Printus is a free WordPress plugin built specifically for WooCommerce. It handles the integration between your store and your printer, formats the order documents, and sends them to PrintNode when a trigger fires.

PrintNode is the service that routes print jobs from your WooCommerce store to your local printer. It works via a small desktop client installed on the computer your printer is connected to. PrintNode offers a free tier of 50 print jobs per month, with affordable paid plans for higher volumes.

Together, this combination gives you fully automatic, cloud-based order printing at minimal or no cost.

Printer Compatibility: What Will and Will Not Work

One of the most common questions is whether this setup works with a specific printer. The short answer is: if your printer can be seen by your operating system, it will work.

This includes:

• Thermal receipt printers — 58mm and 80mm roll printers, widely used in restaurants, cafés, and food delivery setups

• Laser printers — office-grade printers for invoices, packing slips, and labels

• Inkjet printers — standard home and office printers

• Label printers — dedicated label printers for shipping and product labels

• Network printers — shared office printers connected over Wi-Fi or LAN

• USB-connected printers — directly connected to a local computer

The PrintNode client works on Windows and macOS. Once it is installed and running on the computer connected to your printer, that printer becomes available to receive jobs from your WooCommerce store.

What will not work: Printers that are not connected to a computer running the PrintNode client. The client is the link between your store and the physical printer. It needs to be running for print jobs to go through.

Step-by-Step Setup Guide

The full setup takes around 30 minutes. You only need to do it once.

Step 1: Create a PrintNode Account

Go to  printnode.com  and sign up for a free account.

Once you are in the dashboard, go to API Keys and generate a new API key. You will use this to connect Printus to PrintNode.

Step 2: Install the PrintNode Client

Download the PrintNode desktop client from your PrintNode dashboard. Install it on the computer that is connected to your printer.

Sign in with your PrintNode credentials. Within a minute or two, your printer should appear in the Printers section of your PrintNode dashboard, confirming the connection is working.

Troubleshooting tip: If your printer does not appear, make sure it is visible to your operating system first. Open your system’s printer settings and confirm the printer is listed there before relaunching the PrintNode client.

Step 3: Install Printus on WordPress

In your WordPress admin, go to Plugins > Add New and search for “Printus”. Install and activate it.

You can also install it directly from the  WordPress plugin directory .

Step 4: Add Your PrintNode API Key

In your WordPress admin, navigate to Printus > Settings and enter the API key from Step 1. Save your settings.

Printus will connect to your PrintNode account and load the printers you have registered.

Step 5: Configure Document Types and Printer Assignments

Printus can print several document types:

• Receipts — customer-facing summaries of the order

• Invoices — itemised billing documents

• Packing slips — for warehouse and fulfilment teams

• Package labels — shipping and delivery labels

• Custom templates — if you need a layout that is specific to your business

Assign each document type to the printer you want it to go to. You can use different printers for different document types. For example, receipts could go to a thermal printer at the counter while packing slips go to a laser printer in the fulfilment area.

Step 6: Set the Trigger Order Status

Choose which WooCommerce order status fires the print job.

• Processing is the right choice if you want documents to print as soon as an order is paid. This is the most common trigger for restaurants, food delivery stores, and any business where speed matters.

• Completed works better for stores where printing is part of the fulfilment step, not the payment step.

Save your settings.

Step 7: Place a Test Order

Create a test order on your store and manually set it to the trigger status you configured. The print job should fire within a few seconds.

If nothing prints, run through this checklist:

• Is the PrintNode client open and running on the connected computer?

• Is the printer showing as online in your PrintNode dashboard?

• Does the API key in Printus match the one in your PrintNode account?

• Did the test order reach the correct trigger status?

Using Multiple Printers

If you have more than one printer, Printus handles this well. You can assign each document type to a different printer, meaning:

• Kitchen receipt printer gets order tickets

• Counter printer gets customer receipts

• Office laser printer gets invoices and packing slips

All of this is configured from the Printus settings page. There is no limit on the number of printers you can connect through PrintNode.

What Happens When the Printer Is Offline?

This is worth knowing before you go live. If the PrintNode client is not running, or the printer is switched off, print jobs do not disappear. They queue in PrintNode and are delivered the next time the client comes back online.

This means that if your printer goes offline overnight and you restart the client in the morning, any orders that came in while it was down will print when the connection is re-established.

For stores that cannot afford to miss print jobs, it is worth setting the PrintNode client to launch at startup on Windows (or adding it to Login Items on macOS) so it runs automatically after a reboot.

Printus vs Paid Alternatives: What You Are Not Paying For

Several popular plugins charge a monthly fee for WooCommerce automatic order printing. The recurring cost is justified for teams that need advanced features like multi-location management, AI-powered routing, or deep analytics.

But for the core requirement, printing WooCommerce orders automatically to a local printer, Printus delivers the same result for free. It is open-source, actively maintained, and available on WordPress.org with no hidden fees or usage limits beyond PrintNode’s print volume tiers.

If your main need is reliable, automatic printing of orders to one or more printers, there is no reason to pay a monthly subscription to get it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does this work with WooCommerce subscriptions and recurring orders?Yes. Printus triggers on order status changes, so any order that reaches your configured trigger status will print, including renewal orders from WooCommerce Subscriptions.

Can I print to a printer in a different location from my store?Yes. The printer just needs to be connected to a computer running the PrintNode client, regardless of where that computer is located.

Is there a limit on how many orders I can print?PrintNode’s free tier allows 50 prints per month. Paid plans scale from there. Printus itself has no limit.

What order information is included on the printed document?By default, Printus includes standard order details: items, quantities, customer information, and order totals. Custom templates allow you to control exactly what appears and how it is laid out.

Do I need to keep WordPress open for printing to work?No. Printing is triggered automatically by your WooCommerce store and handled by PrintNode. You do not need to have WordPress open in a browser.

Get Started

Automatic WooCommerce order printing is one of the most impactful workflow improvements you can make to your store, and with Printus, it costs nothing to set up.

 Download Printus for free from the WordPress plugin directory  and have automatic printing running on your store today.