That empty cartridge in your drawer is a bigger deal than it looks. Hundreds of millions of ink and toner cartridges end up in landfills every year in North America alone, and only about 20–30% get recycled. The rest sit there for an estimated 450 to 1,000 years, slowly shedding microplastics while leftover ink and toner leach into soil and groundwater.

The good news: recycling a cartridge is free, easy, and in some cases puts money back in your pocket. Here's what actually happens to your empties — and the one option most guides skip.

One scope note: this guide covers the United States. The drop-off locations, mail-back programs, and buyback options below are US programs.

Don't just toss it in the recycling bin

This is the most common mistake. Cartridges do NOT belong in curbside recycling. They're a mix of engineered plastics, metal parts, foam, and residual ink or toner powder that standard municipal sorting can't handle. Tossed in the blue bin, a cartridge either jams the machinery or gets pulled out and landfilled anyway.

They also don't belong in the trash. Beyond the centuries-long decomposition, a cracked cartridge in a garbage truck or landfill can leak residual ink into the surrounding environment.

What actually happens to a recycled cartridge

Two things, depending on condition:

1. Remanufacturing (the best outcome). A well-built cartridge body can be cleaned, fitted with new internal parts, refilled, and tested — then sold as a remanufactured cartridge. This can happen several times over one cartridge's life, and it uses far less energy and raw material than molding a new one from virgin plastic.

2. Material recovery. Cartridges too damaged for reuse get shredded and separated. By some industry estimates, up to 97% of a cartridge's constituent parts — plastics, metals — can be recovered and fed back into manufacturing.

Either way, the cartridge stays out of a landfill for centuries. That's the whole point.

Where to recycle: your actual options

Staples — Arguably the best deal for households. Their Easy Rewards program has historically given around 500 points (roughly $2.50) per recycled cartridge, capped at about 6 per month. Terms change, so confirm before you go — but it's the rare recycling program that pays you.

Best Buy — Free drop-off, no rewards, no account needed. Limited to a few items per household per day. Best when you're already running errands.

Office Depot / OfficeMax — Accepts cartridges with store rewards on qualifying ones; membership and monthly caps apply.

Manufacturer mail-back programs — HP (Planet Partners), Canon, Brother, Lexmark, and Xerox all run take-back programs, usually with free prepaid shipping labels. Some are toner-only or brand-specific, so check your manufacturer's site. HP's program alone claims over a billion cartridges recycled.

Mail-in buyback services — If you have empties of popular OEM toner models in good condition, buyback companies pay cash per cartridge — sometimes a few dollars each. Offices with volume do best here.

Schools and charities — Many run cartridge collection fundraisers. Your empties become someone else's budget.

The option nobody mentions: reuse beats recycling

Here's the honest hierarchy: reuse > recycling > trash. And the simplest form of reuse is buying a remanufactured cartridge in the first place.

Every remanufactured compatible cartridge on the market exists because someone's empty didn't go to a landfill — it went back into service. When you choose a quality remanufactured cartridge over a brand-new one, you're voting for that loop to continue. It's the same logic as buying refurbished electronics. The US EPA's procurement guidelines take the same line, recommending that spent toner cartridges be returned for remanufacturing and reuse.

We wrote a full breakdown of how compatible and remanufactured cartridges compare to OEM on price, quality, and page yield: Compatible vs. OEM Toner: The Honest 2026 Breakdown

Before you recycle: is it actually empty?

Plenty of "dead" cartridges aren't dead — printers often report a cartridge as empty while usable ink or toner still remains. A faded print often means a clogged printhead or a printer that needs a cleaning cycle — not an empty cartridge. Print one of our free test pages first; it takes sixty seconds and shows whether the cartridge is truly spent or just needs maintenance. Recycling a half-full cartridge is its own kind of waste.

What about refilling it yourself?

Refill kits exist and they're cheap. The honest take: refilling is messy, results vary by model, and on some printers it can cause warranty headaches. For most people, the time and ink-stained hands aren't worth the savings versus a professionally remanufactured cartridge. If you enjoy tinkering, go for it — just know what you're signing up for.

Quick answers

Can I recycle any brand?
Retailer drop-offs (Staples, Best Buy, Office Depot) generally take any brand. Manufacturer programs usually take only their own.

Do I get money for recycling?
Sometimes. Staples rewards points and mail-in buyback programs pay; manufacturer mail-backs and Best Buy drop-offs don't. Nobody pays for damaged or off-brand empties nobody can reuse.

How should I store empties before recycling?
In a sealed bag or the original box, upright, away from heat. Toner powder is fine and messy — you don't want it loose in a drawer.

Is recycling really better than just buying new?
Remanufacturing a cartridge body uses a fraction of the energy and material of making one from scratch. And a cartridge kept in circulation is one less sitting in a landfill until the year 3000. So yes — by a wide margin.

Two questions we hear most

My cartridge is a compatible, not the original brand. Can I still recycle it?

Yes — mail-back and drop-off programs generally accept cartridges regardless of brand, and remanufacturers actively want popular compatible cores back. What matters is the cartridge model, not whose label is on it. If a program refuses yours, a local office-supply drop-off bin usually takes it.

Should I recycle the drum unit too?

Yes. On printers with a separate drum, the drum is a second recyclable part with its own return path — the same manufacturer programs that take cartridges usually take drums. If you are not sure whether your printer even has a separate drum, our toner vs. drum guide explains the split — and if the drum is why you are replacing parts in the first place, the printing problems guide shows how to confirm it before you buy.

Program terms and links on this page were last verified in October 2026.

Numbers cited (decomposition estimates, recycling rates, program terms) are industry estimates and change over time — treat them as the honest picture as of 2026, not gospel.