How to Fix Lexmark Printer Printing Symbols Instead of Text?

You hit print on a normal document and your Lexmark printer spits out pages full of random symbols, gibberish characters, or strange code instead of the text you expected. The document looks fine on your screen but the printout is completely unreadable. This problem is almost always caused by a driver issue, a corrupted print job, or a font problem rather than a hardware defect.

Cancel All Print Jobs and Restart the Spooler

A corrupted print job sitting in the queue can cause every page after it to print as symbols. Open Control Panel then Devices and Printers, right-click your Lexmark printer, and select See What Is Printing. Cancel all documents in the queue. Then press Windows key plus R, type services.msc, find Print Spooler, right-click it, and select Restart. Try printing a simple test page after the spooler restarts to see if the issue is fixed.

Update or Reinstall the Lexmark Printer Driver

The most common cause of symbol printing is a corrupted or incompatible printer driver. The driver translates your document into a language the printer understands and if it is damaged the translation comes out as garbage. Go to the Lexmark support website, enter your printer model number, and download the latest driver for your operating system. Before installing, go to Settings then Bluetooth and Devices then Printers and Scanners, click your Lexmark printer, and select Remove Device. Install the fresh driver and add the printer again.

Switch the Printer Language to PCL or PostScript

Lexmark printers support multiple printer languages including PCL, PostScript, and PPDS. If the wrong language is selected the printer interprets the print data incorrectly and outputs symbols. Open the Lexmark printer properties, go to the Advanced tab or Device Settings, and check the printer language setting. Try switching from PostScript to PCL or vice versa. If your driver gives you a choice during installation, select the PCL driver as it is compatible with most documents.

Print as Image to Bypass Font Issues

If the problem only happens with specific documents especially PDFs, the issue might be with embedded fonts that the printer cannot process. Open the document in your PDF reader, go to File then Print, click Advanced or Properties, and check the option that says Print as Image. This converts the entire document into a picture before sending it to the printer which bypasses any font processing issues. The print quality may be slightly lower but the text will print correctly.

Check the USB or Network Connection

A loose or damaged USB cable can cause data corruption during transfer which makes the printer receive garbled instructions. Unplug the USB cable from both ends and plug it back in firmly. Try a different USB cable if you have one. If the printer is connected over WiFi or Ethernet, a weak signal or network congestion can cause similar data corruption. Try printing a test page with the printer connected directly via USB to rule out network issues.

Reset the Printer to Factory Defaults

If none of the above fixes work, resetting the Lexmark printer clears any corrupted internal settings. The reset process varies by model but generally you navigate to the Settings menu on the printer control panel, select Device, then Restore Factory Defaults. After the reset, set up the printer again and install the latest driver from the Lexmark website. Print a test page to confirm the symbols issue is resolved.