Inside this Report:
This research analyzes the key strategic issues, trends, and market drivers for mobile thermal printers used to print receipts, tickets, tags, and labels. The report offers market analysis (historical, prior year, and forecast revenues and unit shipments), vendor considerations, and growth opportunities across the following dimensions: end-user industries, distribution channels, print width, connectivity, and geographies. Within this report, readers can expect key analysis on technology trends, channel requirements, supply chain strategy, and demand drivers going forward.
What Questions are Addressed?
- How have mobile printer market dynamics evolved since last year?
- How have mobile printer applications and functionality expanded in the current landscape?
- Which verticals and regions are driving demand for mobile printer investments?
- How are vendors addressing software and cloud migration gaps?
- What technological trends are influencing mobile thermal printer research and development?
- What channel development strategies are OEMs leveraging to improve vertical reach?
- What are the key drivers and emerging use cases driving mobile printer adoption?
- How should vendors differentiate mobile printer solutions and pursue new market opportunities?
Who Should Read this Report?
This annual research program has been carefully designed for senior decision-makers at mobile printer technology and solution provider companies, including those individuals with the following roles:
- CEO or other C-level executives
- Corporate development and M&A teams
- Marketing executives
- Business development and sales leaders
- Product development and strategy leaders
- Channel management and channel strategy leaders
Organizations Listed in this Report:
- Able Systems
- Avery Dennison
- Bixolon
- Blue Bamboo
- Brother
- Citizen Systems
- Infinite Peripherals
- Fujitsu Components
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- Honeywell
- J Stephen Lab (formerly Sewoo Tech)
- SATO
- Seiko Instruments Inc.
- Star Micronics/Star
- TSC Printers
- Woosim Systems
- Zebra Technologies
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Executive Summary
The global market for mobile printers recovered strongly in 2024, following performance headwinds in 2023. Revenues reached $403.7M for the year.
VDC expects the mobile printer market to experience continued volatility in 2025, as macroeconomic turbulence from tariffs creates skittish investor sentiment and enterprises delay for more clarity on pricing stabilization. Through the first half of the year, vendors have experienced upward price adjustments, aiming to offset some of the rising costs of printer components manufactured in China. Amid ongoing global macroeconomic uncertainty, enterprise customers have adopted a more cautious approach to technology investments, choosing to extend the use of existing mobile printer assets rather than upgrading to newer models. VDC anticipates that the second half of 2025 will offer stronger project opportunities; however, a soft H1 will lead to a modest contraction from 2024.
From a competitive landscape perspective, Zebra Technologies led all other mobile printer brands in 2024. SATO captured the second largest market share for the year, while Honeywell, Avery Dennison, and Toshiba TEC round out the top five mobile printer brands by global market share. Value-tier brands continue to increase competitive pressure on established mobile printer vendors. Companies such as HPRT, X-Printers, and TVS have gained traction in their domestic markets-China and India-driving margin and pricing pressures in these countries. These brands have also seen success in Eastern Europe and Russia, where price sensitivity and a willingness to diversify mobile printer investments have created favorable conditions.
Whether developed in-house or via third party partnerships, device management platforms continue to play an important for expanding mobile printer functionality and asset visibility. Several established vendors such as Zebra, Honeywell, SATO, and TSC among others have enhanced their remote management tools to provide stronger value- add across their customer base. Third-party independent software vendors (ISVs) such as SOTI and 42Gears are also integrating remote management solutions to enhance visibility into mobile printer workflows and improve asset tracking. Greater insight into printer health, battery life and charging performance, maintenance alerts, and output metrics has boosted productivity and reduced operational downtime. Moreover, location services and dashboard analytics support workflow optimization and help prevent device loss.
Key Findings:
- Mobile printer revenues to grow despite the project-based nature of solution sales. Despite performance volatility in 2025, VDC expects mobile printer shipments to perform moderately through the forecast period, as users aim to optimize the point of labeling across use cases. As a result, VDC anticipates accelerated demand patterns following 2025, as enterprises gain better clarity around pricing stabilization and pent-up demand comes to fruition.
- Vendors emphasize flexible media types to differentiate and provide value to customers. Linerless and RFID-enabled mobile printing options have become more widely available to meet evolving customer requirements around sustainability and supplier asset tracking requirements. SATO expanded its mobile printing portfolio across its PWNX series, while Brother has designed purpose- built solutions across its Rugged Jet series to address growing opportunities. Bixolon and TSC have innovated with RFID-enabled mobile printer solutions with their XM7 and Alpha series respectively. Vendors are integrating different media types into mobile printing capabilities to enhance on-demand flexibility.
- Enhanced patient care standards expand opportunities for mobile printer utilization. North America and Europe remain the most mature markets for mobile printer deployments, as increasing facilities development and stronger emphasis on patient care outcomes have driven project opportunities in the region. As hospitals have faced challenges with space optimizations, healthcare organizations have shifted to mobile printers for their ergonomics, supporting workflows across lab diagnostics and patience bedside care.
- Omnichannel order fulfillment to expand the application scope of mobile printer deployments. As retailers aim to offer flexible fulfilment channels across store locations and warehousing facilities, strategies such as BOPIS, curbside pickup, and ship-from-store have seen an uptick within retailer operations. These purchasing channels increase the need for accurate inventory management and stock replenishment, so retailers can provide agility in order fulfillment. As a result, mobile printers have experienced increased utilization around inventory management, on-demand shipping and receiving, and mPOS use cases.
- Enterprises require asset visibility capabilities to optimize mobile printer fleet management. To optimize mobile printer performance, customers require stronger data driven tools and hardware visibility functionality to streamline firmware updates, enable device diagnostics, and improve hardware tracking. Honeywell continues to improve its proprietary asset visibility platform and SATO has enhanced remote management capabilities through its AEP solution. From a third-party standpoint, SOTI commands a leading share of the MDM landscape, while emerging ISVs such as 42Gears have developed strong vendor relationships to expand their brand visibility.
- Digitization continues to pose a real threat to traditional mobile printing uses cases. As the viability of electronic shelf labels (ESLs) continues to expand and the cost of these tags decreases, workflows such as price marking and shelf labeling face potential redundancy in retail environments. VDC's research suggests ESLs are also gaining traction within warehousing across shelves and storage bins, posing a threat to purpose-built mobile printers. Similarly, increased acceptance of digital receipts in POS and other applications directly impact mPOS sales for receipt printing use cases.
- Competition from enterprise mobility manufacturers and adjacent AIDC vendors is intensifying. While Urovo is more widely known for its mobile computer portfolio, it has continued to release mobile printing solutions with its established K329 / K419 series, and its latest all-in-one print and scan K388S solution. Newland AIDC emphasized its dual label and receipt mobile printing solution with the NLS-PP310 model. SUNMI released its latest dual receipt and label printing mobile payment terminal to capture share of the mPOS opportunity across retail, hospitality, and field sales, while also providing application flexibility in logistics workflows.
Table of Contents
Inside this Report
What Questions are Addressed?
Who Should Read this Report?
Organizations Listed in this Report
Executive Summary
Global Market Overview
Regional Forecasts
- The Americas
- North America
- Latin America
- Europe and the Middle East (EMEA)
- Asia-Pacific (APAC)
Comparative Forecasts by Vertical
- Retail
- Transportation & Logistics (T&L)
- Manufacturing
- Healthcare
- Commercial Services
- Government
Comparative Forecast by Distribution Channel
Next Generation Mobile Printer Technology
- Connectivity (Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, & NFC)
- Software Feature Enhancement (MDM, Device Diagnostics, Performance Tracking, and More)
- Battery & Charging Enhancement
- Payment Capture
- RFID-Enabled Mobile Printing
- Digital Threats to Traditional Mobile Printing Workflows
Next Generation Mobile Printer Technology
Vendor Profiles
- Avery Dennison
- Bixolon
- Brother
- EPSON
- Honeywell
- SATO
- Star Micronics
- Toshiba
- TSC
- Zebra Technologies
About the Authors
About VDC Research
List of Exhibits
- Exhibit 1: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Region (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 2: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Region (Thousands of Units)
- Exhibit 3: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Region (Average Factory Selling Price (AFSP) - Dollars)
- Exhibit 4: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 5: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Thousands of Units)
- Exhibit 6: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Average Factory Selling Price (AFSP) - Dollars)
- Exhibit 7: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Connectivity (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 8: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Vertical Market (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 9: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Vertical Market (Thousands of Units)
- Exhibit 10: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Vertical Market (Average Factory Selling Price (AFSP) - Dollars)
- Exhibit 11: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Application/Installation Environment (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 12: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Distribution Channel (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 13: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers
- Exhibit 14: North America Shipments of Mobile Printers
- Exhibit 15: Latin America Shipments of Mobile Printers
- Exhibit 16: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 17: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Average Factory Selling Price (AFSP) - Dollars)
- Exhibit 18: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Thousands of Units)
- Exhibit 19: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Connectivity (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 20: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Vertical Market (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 21: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Application/Installation Environment (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 22: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Distribution Channel (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 23: North America Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Thousands of Units)
- Exhibit 24: Latin America Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Thousands of Units)
- Exhibit 25: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Primary Connectivity (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 26: North America Shipments of Mobile Printers by Primary Connectivity (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 27: Latin America Shipments of Mobile Printers by Primary Connectivity (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 28: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Vertical Market (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 29: North America Shipments of Mobile Printers by Vertical Market (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 30: Latin America Shipments of Mobile Printers by Vertical Market (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 31: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Application/Installation Environment (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 32: North America Shipments of Mobile Printers by Application/Installation Environment (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 33: Latin America Shipments of Mobile Printers by Application/Installation Environment (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 34: Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Distribution Channel (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 35: North America Shipments of Mobile Printers by Distribution Channel (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 36: Latin Americas Shipments of Mobile Printers by Distribution Channel (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 37: EMEA Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 38: EMEA Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Average Factory Selling Price (AFSP) - Dollars)
- Exhibit 39: EMEA Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Thousands of Units)
- Exhibit 40: EMEA Shipments of Mobile Printers by Connectivity (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 41: EMEA Shipments of Mobile Printers by Vertical Market (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 42: EMEA Shipments of Mobile Printers by Application/Installation Environment (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 43: EMEA Shipments of Mobile Printers by Distribution Channel (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 44: Asia-Pacific Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 45: Asia-Pacific Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Average Factory Selling Price (AFSP) - Dollars)
- Exhibit 46: Asia-Pacific Shipments of Mobile Printers by Print Width (Thousands of Units)
- Exhibit 47: Asia-Pacific Shipments of Mobile Printers by Connectivity (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 48: Asia-Pacific Shipments of Mobile Printers by Vertical Market (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 49: Asia-Pacific Shipments of Mobile Printers by Application/Installation Environment (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 50: Asia-Pacific Shipments of Mobile Printers by Distribution Channel (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 51: Global Shipments of Mobile Printers by Country (Millions of Dollars)
- Exhibit 1: Global Shipments of Mobile Thermal Printers Segmented by Supplier Share
- Exhibit 2: Americas Shipments of Mobile Thermal Printers Segmented by Supplier Share
- Exhibit 3: North America Shipments of Stationary Mobile Thermal Printers Segmented by Supplier Share
- Exhibit 4: Latin America Shipments of Stationary Mobile Thermal Printers Segmented by Supplier Share
- Exhibit 5: EMEA Shipments of Mobile Thermal Printers Segmented by Supplier Share
- Exhibit 6: Asia-Pacific Shipments of Mobile Thermal Printers Segmented by Supplier Share