If you have an iPhone and a USB-only printer, you deserve the straight answer first: no adapter, cable or app makes that pair print directly. iOS printing means AirPrint, and AirPrint means a network. The good news — three honest routes do work, and one of them costs nothing.
Android phones can host a USB printer because Android allows USB host mode and third-party driver apps. iOS does not work that way. Apple built printing into iPhone as AirPrint — a wireless standard — and iOS gives apps no path to drive a USB printer through the Lightning or USB-C port. Any video or app claiming direct iPhone-to-USB-printer printing is selling you something that cannot do what it says. Here is what actually works.
It is not a missing adapter. iOS exposes no USB printer-class driver support to apps, and the iPhone's port is not offered to apps as a general USB host for printers. The USB-C port on newer iPhones changes the plug, not this policy. Save your money: no dongle fixes an operating-system decision.
If your printer has Wi-Fi (many 'USB' office printers actually have a radio switched off, or a Wi-Fi Direct mode), connect it to your router. The iPhone then finds it automatically — open the document, tap Share → Print, choose the printer. No app, no driver, no cable. Check the printer's panel for a wireless setup option before concluding it has none.
Keep the USB printer connected to a PC or Mac that stays on, share it on the network, and bridge it to AirPrint. On a Mac, sharing is built in and iPhones see the printer once it is shared with the right options. On Windows, the printer maker's app or a small sharing utility does the bridging. The honest cost: the computer must be awake whenever you print — this is the same PC-bridge idea Android users use, with AirPrint as the last hop.
HP Smart, Canon PRINT, Epson iPrint and Brother's app can print from iPhone — but again over Wi-Fi only, to their own network-capable models. If iPhone printing is a daily need, the real fix is the permanent one: replace the USB-only printer with a Wi-Fi model that supports AirPrint and Mopria. Then both iPhone and Android print natively, with no bridge computer and no third-party driver apps at all.
The full phone-to-USB-printer method, shown live with the cable, the app and a real print.
▶️ Watch Full VideoThe connector changed; the printing system did not. iOS still offers apps no way to drive a USB printer, on any iPhone model. USB-C helps with drives, displays and hubs — printers still speak to iPhone only through AirPrint over a network.
Indirectly, yes in a clumsy sense: send the file to the Android phone (chat, email, drive) and print from there with the USB method. It works in an emergency, but as a daily system it is friction — the PC-bridge or a Wi-Fi printer is the grown-up answer.
Two logos: AirPrint support for the iPhone, and Wi-Fi (ideally dual-band) for the network. With those, printing from iPhone is the built-in Share → Print flow with zero extra apps — and Android prints to the same machine through Mopria or the maker's app.