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- HP Community
- Printers
- Printer Ink Cartridges & Print Quality
- yellow cartridge showing empty when I have ink inside. Why?

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03-03-2025 10:05 AM
Old cartridge leaked and the ink dried out. Clean the printhead and / or the contacts.
Some printers have a printhead cleaning procedure.
| To clean the printhead on an HP printer, access the printer settings through the HP Smart app, navigate to "Print Quality Tools," and select "Clean Printhead"; this will initiate a cleaning cycle where the printer will automatically run a cleaning process to clear any clogs in the printhead |
This link shows cleaning the 8600 printhead and removal is shown here.
This is another type of printhead cleaning, different from the above.
Cleaning and removing ink is shown below by our "Scullery" team.
An HP original video on how to clean the printheads by our experts. Yes, this can get messy, but it works. If your ink levels are good but you are printing blank pages then this is likely the solution.
Official HP advice on cleaning.
let me know which of these worked, if any.
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03-03-2025 12:59 PM
You should never let a cartridge to empty as ink can dry out making the cleaning harder.
Some HP printer require that all the ink be replaced when one goes empty. The purpose, or so I have been told, is to prevent cartridges running completely dry causing a major cleaning problem with the printhead. I think it is to just sell more ink, but I do know that a printhead replacement is usually more than the cost of buying a used printer of the same model. Some printheads are not designed to be removed.
I do not have an instant ink printer. My understanding is that if you run out of ink, or you cancel your subscription, you can use genuine Hewlett Packard cartridges either original or refilled. They must have an HP chip in the cartridge.
The below type is unlikely to work.
Thank you for using HP products and posting to the community.
I am a community volunteer and do not work for HP. If you find
this post useful click the Yes button. If I helped solve your
problem please mark this as a solution so others can find it