How to Reset Printer Driver Settings to Windows Defaults in Windows 11

Printing Preferences vs. Printer Properties: What Actually Resets

Printing Preferences control the things you change most often — paper size, print quality, color vs. black and white, duplex printing (printing on both sides of the page). These are stored per user and don’t need administrator rights to change.

Changing these requires administrator access because they affect everyone who prints to that device.

When someone says a printer is “printing weird” after a driver update or an app changed a setting, it’s almost always the Printing Preferences that got changed, not the Properties. Start there first.

Reset Printing Preferences to the Driver’s Default

This is the fastest fix and doesn’t need administrator privileges. It resets things like paper size, orientation, quality, and color settings back to what the driver ships with.

1. Open Settings and go to Bluetooth & devices, then Printers & scanners. You'll see a list of every printer installed on the PC.

   

2. Click the printer you want to reset. The page expands to show device details and a row of buttons.

   

3. Click Printing preferences. This opens the driver's own settings window, which looks different depending on the manufacturer — HP, Canon, and Brother all use their own layouts here instead of a standard Windows dialog.
4. Look for a button labeled Restore Defaults, Default, or sometimes just an icon that looks like a reset arrow. On most drivers it's on the main tab or inside an Advanced tab. Click it.
5. Click OK or Apply to save. The dialog closes and the printer now uses its default preferences again.

You can also get to this same dialog through the older Control Panel route: open Control Panel, go to Devices and Printers, right-click the printer, and choose Printing preferences. Both paths open the identical driver window — use whichever one you're used to.

Reset Printer Properties Defaults

Use this when the machine-wide default is wrong for everyone on the PC, not just you. This step requires administrator privileges because it changes settings for the whole PC.

1. Open Control Panel and go to Devices and Printers.
2. Right-click the printer and choose Printer properties (not Printing preferences — the wording is easy to mix up, and this is the properties dialog with the manufacturer name in the title bar).
3. Click the Advanced tab.
4. Click Printing Defaults. This opens the same style of driver dialog as Printing Preferences, but any changes here apply to every user account on the machine.
5. Click Restore Defaults if the driver offers it, then click OK to confirm and close each dialog.

If the Restore Defaults Button Is Missing or Greyed Out

Not every driver includes a reset button — this is a driver feature, not something Windows guarantees. It depends on which driver Windows installed:

• Generic / Microsoft IPP Class Driver — a basic, built-in driver Windows installs automatically for many network and USB printers. These stripped-down drivers usually have far fewer tabs and no restore option at all.
• Full manufacturer driver (Type 3 or Type 4) — downloaded from HP, Canon, Epson, Brother, etc. These almost always include a proper Restore Defaults button because the manufacturer built a fuller settings UI.

If your printer is using the generic driver, there's often no button to click — you'd need to manually set each option (paper size, quality, duplex) back to what you want, or install the full manufacturer driver from their website, which usually brings the reset option with it.

Fully Reset the Driver by Removing and Reinstalling It

When Printing Preferences and Printer Properties still don't fix odd behavior, a full driver reinstall clears out anything corrupted in the current install. This includes jammed spool jobs, missing options, or behavior changes after a Windows 10 to Windows 11 upgrade. This requires administrator privileges, and removing the printer will delete any custom preferences you've set, so note down anything important first.

1. Open Settings, go to Bluetooth & devices, then Printers & scanners.
2. Click the printer, then click Remove device. Confirm when Windows asks if you're sure. The printer disappears from the list.
3. Open Control Panel, go to Devices and Printers, right-click any remaining icon for that printer, and choose Remove device if it's still listed. Sometimes the driver package stays registered even after you remove it from Settings.
4. Open Print Management (search for it in the Start menu — it's a built-in admin console) if you want to remove the leftover driver package itself, not just the printer object. Expand Print Servers, your PC name, then Drivers, right-click the driver, and choose Delete.
5. Reconnect the printer, either by plugging it back in (USB) or clicking Add device in Settings › Bluetooth & devices › Printers & scanners for a network printer. Windows detects it and either installs its built-in driver or prompts you to install the manufacturer's driver.
6. Install the manufacturer's driver from their website if you want the full preferences dialog rather than the generic one. Run the installer and follow its prompts. Restart the PC when it finishes. A restart isn't always required, but it clears out any print spooler cache tied to the old install and avoids the printer reappearing with stale settings.

If the printer shows as Offline or fails to reinstall, check that it's powered on and connected to the same network or USB port, then try Add device again. A driver conflict from the old install is the most common cause of a failed reinstall — deleting the driver package in Print Management before reconnecting usually clears it.

Check the "Let Windows Manage My Default Printer" Setting

This setting gets confused with driver preferences a lot, but it does something different — it controls which printer Windows automatically picks as your default, not how that printer prints. If your print jobs keep going to the wrong printer, this is the setting to check, not the driver preferences.

1. Open Settings, go to Bluetooth & devices, then Printers & scanners.
2. Find the toggle labeled Let Windows manage my default printer near the top of the page.
3. Turn it off if you want to manually choose a fixed default printer instead of Windows switching based on which one you used most recently at your current location.

Turning this off doesn't touch any driver settings — it only changes which printer gets picked automatically. If you're chasing a printing-quality or paper-size problem, this toggle won't fix it either way.

What to Do Next

If resetting preferences and reinstalling the driver still doesn't clear up the problem, the issue is probably sitting in the print spooler rather than the driver itself — clearing the spooler queue and restarting the Print Spooler service is the next thing worth trying. If the printer connects over a network, it's also worth confirming it still has the correct IP address, since a change there can look exactly like a driver problem even though the driver itself is fine.