The Kodak Step Instant Printer Review Not to be confused with the comparable Kodak Step Instant Camera, which is a cheap and cheerful Zink printer that can connect to your phone to print your favorite images on print paper, is a reliable and reasonable alternative for a portable Zink printer, with a few drawbacks to bemoan. Solid and sticky describe zinc.
There are other other Zink printers that are comparable, therefore the Kodak Step doesn’t provide anything novel that the competition does not. However, it is inexpensive, small, and offers a variety of simple editing tools, making it one of the best choices in a competitive industry.
Table of Contents
Kodak Step Instant Printer review: Design, Build,, Print Quality, Battery life, and Price
Design and Build
- Simple plastic design
- Cheerful color range
- compact
Kodak makes things simple with the Step printer.
This plastic block is svelte and can easily fit in a pocket or purse. Beyond your choice of hue, the design has a subtle touch that is available in white, black, blue, or pink.
The little black-and-yellow stripe on each end is the only thing that truly sticks out. It’s only a sticker; the top one lets you remove it if you’re not a fan, but alas, with enough use and abuse, it’s also likely to peel off.
Only one button to switch the printer on and off and two LEDs for power and charging are there. It is simple, quick, and very impossible to do it incorrectly to load paper for printing by sliding the rear of the body.
Apps and Features
- Easy to pair with free smartphone apps
- Edit photos and make collages
- A little buggy
The Kodak Step may be operated almost entirely via a free iOS or Android app. The creation of a Kodak account is optional; everything functions just fine without one.
The printer and software must first be paired, which is a simple process. They connected through Bluetooth, and in about a minute I had the app set up and ready to use with the printer.
You may choose images from your device’s gallery or add additional possibilities by linking the app to your Facebook, Instagram, or Google picture library.
There are several choices available after choosing a picture. You can only print it in landscape or portrait orientation, with the choice to print the whole frame or crop it if it doesn’t fit the Zink print’s recommended aspect ratio (most of your photos will win).
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But picture editing is also an option. Applying Instagram-style filters is an easy way to do this, or you can get more creative and alter the brightness, hue, or color temperature, or add frames, stickers, text, or pictures in vibrant colors. You may also combine many photographs into one print to make collages, but bear in mind that each image can end up being rather little owing to the size of the paper.
The Kodak Step Prints app, which is nicely organized and much simpler to use than the laborious step-by-step training procedure indicates, is what most impresses me.
But even so, it’s not flawless. The most comprehensive set of picture hue sliders only show on the app’s “Print preview” tab, not, as you would assume, in the “Edit photographs” area. This is one of the more peculiar choices.
There are other bugs to fix. Occasionally, this program may stall, particularly while loading photographs for editing. The brightness slider for the “Print preview” also looks to be fully broken, with no way to reduce the brightness below the image’s starting point if you press the bar.
Kodak Step Instant: Print Quality
- Small Zinc Mold 2×3”
- Sticky handle
- Decent details and colors
A popular format for instant printers and cameras in recent years, the Kodak Step prints on ink-free Zink prints.
The key advantages of Zink are that each print really contains a sticky covering that you can peel off the back and transform any picture print into a sticker. The prints are also inexpensive and quick to produce, and the printer doesn’t need an ink cartridge.
There are really two drawbacks. One of them is size; Zink prints measure just 2 by 3 inches. Because of this, the printer is naturally quite portable, so it’s not entirely horrible. However, they are still too little to be exhibited anyplace; instead, they would be better suited for collages or being stuffed inside a handbag.
The greater issue is quality. By Zink standards, it’s not awful; it prints with a good color range and retains a fair amount of picture detail. Every picture, however, is incomplete, and there isn’t any of the panache or flare you’d find in an Instax Mini Link or other instant film printer.
Kodak Step Instant: Battery life
- Battery up to 25 prints
- Charging via Micro-USB
The Kodak Step can reportedly print up to 25 prints on a full charge. I didn’t test it much, so I can’t confirm this, but it worked flawlessly and happy to go through a whole pack of Zink paper with plenty of standby time.
The need to utilize a Micro-USB cable for charging is the one slight disappointment. It seems reasonable that you won’t really own or utilize any other Micro-USB products at this point because this has long been the charging standard.
It’s a little disappointing that Kodak’s product can’t utilize the more recent universal USB-C standard, even though it comes with a connection that you can plug into your current USB charger.
Price and availability
The Step printer costs £69.99 / $99.99, available from Amazon, Walmart, and more, making it one of Zink’s more affordable printers.
Zinc paper is also reasonably priced, but it still costs around 50p or 50c each sheet. This is more than Instax prints, but it’s still enough that you don’t want to ignore the print and burn it.
If you want to see how the competition compares, be sure to read our guide to the best instant printers. If you want to shoot images rather than merely print them, read our guide to the best instant cameras (many do both).
Indictment
While not an instant printer in itself, the Kodak Step Printer is a superb illustration of its design.
It feels sturdy, is tiny and compact, has a respectable battery life, and is simple to print with. Although I did run across a few problems and difficulties along the process, the related applications are likewise straightforward, fast to install, and provide a number of choices for altering your picture.
The best part is that, at the time of writing, it performs essentially the same functions while running significantly less expensively than most of its rivals. This makes it an easy recommendation.
