How to Print from a Mac at a Windows Office

Applies to: macOS
Article Type: How-To
Last Updated: 2026-08-09

Summary

Everyone around you prints to \\printserver\Finance-MFP, that path means nothing to a Mac, and the printer list on your machine is empty. This article adds the same office printer to your Mac three different ways — automatic discovery, the Windows print server browser, and a direct IP address — then covers the driver choice that decides whether you get stapling and duplex, and the failure modes worth recognising before you send a second copy.

In this guide

• 1. Collect the Three Details IT Has to Give You
• 2. Open Printers & Scanners and Start Adding a Printer
• 3. Try the Default Tab, Which Finds Some Office Printers and Not Others
• 4. Add a Windows Print Server Queue From the Windows Tab
• 5. Add the Printer by IP Address When Browsing Finds Nothing
• 6. Choose the Driver, and Know What the Generic One Costs
• 7. Sign In and Print a Test Page

Before You Start

• Your Mac on the office network, over Wi-Fi or Ethernet. Working from home, connect the VPN first — a print server is inside the company network and nothing here reaches it otherwise.
• Your normal work username and password. No admin rights are needed to add a printer that macOS already has software for.
• The printer's name, or its IP address, or the path a colleague uses. Step 1 covers what to ask for and how to ask.

Instructions

1. Collect the Three Details IT Has to Give You

Every route below needs the same small set of facts, and getting them in one message saves three rounds of back-and-forth.

Ask a colleague on Windows first — the path is printed on their machine already. In File Explorer they can open Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Printers & scanners, click the printer, and read its name and location. Failing that, send IT this:

"I'm on a Mac and need to add the [Finance floor] printer. Please send me: the printer's queue name and the print server it lives on (the \\server\queue path my colleagues use), the printer's IP address or hostname, and the make and model. If the queue needs specific access rights, please add my account."

What each one is for:

• The \\server\queue path. Two facts in one: the server name and the queue name. \\printserver\Finance-MFP means a server called printserver sharing a queue called Finance-MFP. Your Mac reaches that same queue over SMB — the same file-sharing language behind How to Connect a Mac to a Shared Network Drive — and writes it smb://printserver/Finance-MFP. Step 4 finds it by name so you rarely type the address, but knowing the two halves is what lets you recognise the right entry in the list.
• The IP address or hostname. Your fallback when browsing finds nothing, used in step 5. It looks like 10.20.30.40 or finance-mfp.contoso.local.
• The make and model. This decides your driver in step 6, and whether you keep stapling and double-sided printing.

2. Open Printers & Scanners and Start Adding a Printer

Every route starts from the same pane, and the button that opens the Add window names three kinds of device at once.

1. Click the Apple menu in the top-left corner of the screen, then click System Settings.
2. Click Printers & Scanners in the sidebar. If the sidebar is arranged differently on your version of macOS, type printers into the search field at the very top of the sidebar and click the Printers & Scanners result.
3. On the right, click Add Printer, Scanner, or Fax. A new Add Printer window opens in front of System Settings.
4. Look at the row of buttons across the top of that window. Default is selected, and IP and Windows sit beside it. Those three are the three routes in steps 3, 4 and 5 — the window is the same one throughout, so you can move between them without starting over.

3. Try the Default Tab, Which Finds Some Office Printers and Not Others

Default lists printers that announce themselves on the network, which covers a good share of modern office machines and none of the older ones.

1. With Default selected, wait fifteen to thirty seconds. macOS listens for printers advertising themselves and fills the list as it hears them.
2. Read the Kind column beside each entry. Bonjour and AirPrint are the self-announcing kinds, and those are the printers this tab can find.
3. If the printer you want is listed, click it. The Name, Location and Use fields at the bottom fill in on their own.
4. Change Name to something you will recognise in a print dialog — Finance MFP 3rd floor rather than the model number.
5. Check the Use field. When it already names your printer's model, go on to the next step. When it names something generic instead, set it now using section 6, then come back here.
6. Click Add. The printer appears in the Printers & Scanners list on the left of System Settings. Continue to section 7 to sign in and print a test page.

Nothing in the list? That is the normal result at a Windows-first company, not a fault on your Mac. A queue shared from a Windows print server does not advertise itself the way a standalone network printer does. Go to section 4.

4. Add a Windows Print Server Queue From the Windows Tab

This is the route that matches what your colleagues are actually doing, because it connects to the same shared queue on the same server.

1. In the Add Printer window, click Windows at the top.
2. A network browser fills the window in three columns. The left column lists the Windows workgroups or domains on your network.
3. Click your workgroup or domain in the left column. The middle column fills with the servers sharing printers inside it.
4. Click the print server in the middle column — the printserver half of the \\printserver\Finance-MFP path your colleague gave you.
5. If a sign-in box appears, enter your work username and password for that server, and see section 7 for the username format to use. Tick the option to remember it in your keychain so you are not asked again. Nothing is stored on the server; this saves the sign-in on your own Mac, and deleting it later changes nothing but makes you type the password again.
6. Click the queue in the right column — the Finance-MFP half of the same path. Names match exactly, including capitalisation.
7. Set Name to something readable, check the Use field against step 6, then click Add. The printer appears in the Printers & Scanners list.

The server is not in the list. Browsing depends on the server answering a broadcast, and plenty of corporate networks stop that traffic. Do not keep retrying — go to section 5 and add the printer by IP address, which does not depend on browsing at all. If IP printing also fails, send IT this: "My Mac cannot browse to \\printserver\Finance-MFP from the Add Printer window. Please send me the printer's IP address or hostname and the protocol it accepts (IPP, LPD or HP Jetdirect), and confirm my account may print to that queue."

5. Add the Printer by IP Address When Browsing Finds Nothing

IP printing skips discovery entirely and speaks straight to the printer, which is why it works when the other two tabs come up empty.

1. In the Add Printer window, click IP at the top. A form appears with Address, Protocol, Queue, Name, Location and Use.
2. Type the printer's IP address or hostname into Address — 10.20.30.40 or finance-mfp.contoso.local. A green dot and a message confirming the address is valid appear underneath once macOS reaches it.
3. Click the Protocol pop-up menu and choose what IT told you. The choices are AirPrint, Internet Printing Protocol - IPP, Line Printer Daemon - LPD and HP Jetdirect – Socket. When nobody can tell you, try Internet Printing Protocol - IPP first and HP Jetdirect – Socket second; those two cover most office hardware.
4. Leave Queue empty unless IT gave you a queue name. Empty means the printer's default queue, which is what most printers expect.
5. Set Name and Location to something you will recognise in the print dialog.
6. Check the Use field against step 6, then click Add.

Note: An IP address changes when IT moves or rebuilds a printer, and your Mac keeps pointing at the old one — the symptom is a printer that worked for months and then stopped with no error. A hostname such as finance-mfp.contoso.local survives that, so ask for one and use it in preference to the numbers.

6. Choose the Driver, and Know What the Generic One Costs

The Use field decides which of the printer's features reach your print dialog, and the fallback is genuinely a fallback.

1. Read what Use already says. When it names your exact model, macOS has the manufacturer's software and there is nothing to change.
2. When it does not, click the Use pop-up menu. Choose the option for picking the software yourself — Select Software on current macOS, Select Printer Software on older versions. A Printer Software list opens.
3. Type your model into the search field at the top of that list, click the match, and click OK.
4. If your model is not there, go back to the Use pop-up menu and choose the generic printer software option. Apple's own guidance is that a printer connected this way may offer limited features — in practice that means double-sided printing, stapling, hole punching, tray selection and colour controls disappear from the print dialog, while ordinary single-sided printing works.
5. AirPrint appears in the Use menu only when the printer supports it. If it is absent, that printer does not do AirPrint and there is nothing to enable.
6. To get the full feature set back later, download the software for your model from the manufacturer's own site, install it, then remove and re-add the printer. Removing a printer deletes only that entry on your Mac — the printer itself, everyone else's connection to it, and any job already printed are unaffected, and you can add it back in a minute.

When the installer needs an admin password. Manufacturer printer software often does. That is not something to work around: send IT a ticket — "Please install the macOS driver for [make and model] on my Mac. Without it I only get single-sided printing through generic software." — and keep printing through the generic option until they do.

7. Sign In and Print a Test Page

A work queue usually wants proof of who you are, and the username format is where Mac users get stuck.

1. Open any document and press Command + P.
2. Click the Printer pop-up menu at the top of the print dialog and choose the printer you added.
3. Click Print.
4. If a sign-in box appears, type your username in one of these forms, stopping at the first that works: your plain username (dsmith), your work email address ([email protected]), or the domain and username joined by a backslash (CONTOSO\dsmith). The third is what a colleague means by "put the domain in front", and it is the one Windows-managed print servers most often want.
5. Tick the option to remember the password in your keychain, then click OK.
6. Walk to the printer. At a machine that releases jobs on a badge tap or a PIN, your page waits in a held list until you authenticate there — it has not failed, it is queued.
7. Back on the Mac, click the printer in Printers & Scanners and click Printer Queue to watch what happened. An empty queue means the job left your Mac; a job sitting in the list means it did not.

Note: Three wrong passwords in a row locks a work account in some organisations. If the first two username formats are rejected, stop and ask a colleague which format their PC uses rather than guessing a third time.

Troubleshooting

WARNING

A printer that spits out pages of %%BOF-style text, stray symbols or a wall of code is not broken and neither is your file. It is receiving instructions in a language it does not read, which means the wrong driver — almost always generic PostScript software sent to a printer that expects something else. Take the paper out of the tray to stop the waste, cancel the job in Printer Queue, then remove the printer and add it again with the correct software from step 6.

Symptom / Error	Potential Cause	Solution
The printer is not in the Default list	The queue is shared from a Windows print server and does not advertise itself	Use the Windows tab in step 4, or add it by IP address in step 5. This is expected behaviour, not a fault.
The Windows tab shows no servers at all	Network browsing traffic is blocked between your Mac and the server	Add the printer by IP address instead, following step 5. Ask IT: "Please send me the IP address or hostname of \\printserver\Finance-MFP and the protocol it accepts."
Pages come out as code or random symbols	Wrong driver for the printer's language	Remove the printer, add it again, and set Use to your exact model following step 6.
Jobs pile up and nothing prints, with no error	The queue paused itself after a failed job or a sign-in it could not complete	Open Printers & Scanners, click the printer, click Printer Queue, and click Resume. Delete the stuck job first if it reappears — the job is discarded, and printing the document again re-sends it.
The job disappears from your Mac but no paper appears	A follow-me or secure-release printer holding the job for you	Go to the printer and authenticate at it with your badge or PIN. Jobs are usually discarded after a set number of hours, so collect it the same day.
The sign-in box is rejected every time	Wrong username format for a Windows domain	Try dsmith, then [email protected], then CONTOSO\dsmith, as in step 7. If all three fail, ask IT: "Please confirm my account can print to \\printserver\Finance-MFP and tell me the username format to use from a Mac."
Double-sided or stapling is missing from the print dialog	Printing through generic software	Install the manufacturer's macOS software for your model, then remove and re-add the printer, following step 6.

Related Articles

• How to Add a Network Printer on Windows (No Admin Required) — the Windows version of this task, and the guide your colleagues were sent
• How to Fix Common Printer Issues (No Admin Required)
• What to Do When You're Assigned a Mac at a Windows Company
• How to Connect a Mac to a Shared Network Drive — the same server-path translation, for files rather than printers

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