Does the cleaning process in laser printers use up toner?

[sthocast]

This question came up in a discussion, and I had to admit that I wasn't sure.

I know from experience that cleaning the nozzles on an inkjet printer takes a great deal of ink. Unfortunately, since I do most of my printing at the office, my inkjets at home are used very infrequently and therefore see the need to clean themselves before use. Same is true with my Canon LBP5050n color laser, which spends a good minute cleaning (or calibrating) itself, after printing the first job in the queue. Despite this, it's still running on the toner cartridges it came with after a few years (and only a few hundred pages) of use.

Is this because the cleaning process is completely different (no clogged nozzles to clean) and uses little or no toner, or just because the cartridges have so much toner in them?

I appear to be the go-to person when it comes to printer recommendations, so knowing this seemed important in order to give informed advice.

Any information on this would be greatly appreciated, thanks in advance!

 

[InkCartridges]

I'm not 100% sure but I'm guessing that laser printers probably don't need to use toner during the cleaning process, as you mention there are no nozzles that need to be cleaned etc.

But the reason that your toner cartridge is lasting longer is probably more to do with the fact that toner cartridges generally have a much larger page yield than most ink cartridges.