The Ricoh ScanSnap iX2400 document scanner, which replaces the venerable ScanSnap iX1400, delivers a substantial upgrade. It's faster than its predecessor, has an automatic document feeder (ADF) twice the size, and adds an advanced skew-detection system and a removable attachment for feeding receipts, the Receipt Guide. Perhaps most important, Ricoh hasn’t raised the price: The iX1400 was introduced in 2021 at $395, while the iX2400 slips in at $369.99.

So far, so good. But how does the iX2400 compare with the flagship ScanSnap iX2500, our Editors' Choice for the best desktop document scanner for homes and small offices? The iX2400 doesn’t have the iX2500’s 5-inch color touch screen or Wi-Fi connectivity. However, it offers the same fast scan speeds and large-capacity ADF, along with the skew detection and Receipt Guide. That particular combination of features makes the iX2400 a good alternative if you have a limited budget and don’t need a touch screen or wireless connectivity.

Design: Built for Speed and Convenience

At 6.3 by 11.5 by 6.3 inches (HWD), the ScanSnap iX2400 is fairly compact for a document scanner of its speed and paper capacity. For comparison, it's the same size as the iX2500, and a little taller (6.3 inches versus 6.0 inches) than the previous-model iX1400.

(Credit: David English)

On the other hand, the iX2400 is considerably larger than the Epson WorkForce ES-C320W (a trim 4.9 by 11.7 by 4.1 inches) and somewhat smaller than the Brother ADS-4300N (7.5 by 11.7 by 8.5 inches) and Canon imageFormula R40 Document Scanner Receipt Edition (9.6 by 11.4 by 9.9 inches).

If desk space is a critical issue, you may want to favor the smaller Epson WorkForce ES-C320W, with one caveat: The highly space-efficient models tend to be slower, with less-generous paper capacities. Otherwise, the relatively slim ScanSnap iX2400’s 6.3-inch depth could give it an advantage over the Brother ADS-4300N or the Canon R40 Receipt Edition.

Keep in mind that these measurements are for the scanners when they’re closed. The devices can expand by as much as two to three times that when you extend the plastic guides upward and outward to accommodate your documents. For example, the ScanSnap iX2400 expands to 11.3 by 11.5 by 18.8 inches when its paper-extension tray and document stacker are fully stretched out.

(Credit: David English)

The ScanSnap iX2400 tips the scales at 7.1 pounds, versus 7.5 pounds for the ScanSnap iX1400, although weight isn't as crucial with desktop devices as it is with portable models. Among the other comparable scanners I've mentioned, the Epson ES-C320W is the lightest at 3.9 pounds, while the ScanSnap iX2500 (7.7 pounds) is the heaviest.

Despite its lower price, the ScanSnap iX2400 has the same duplex-capable 100-sheet ADF as the ScanSnap iX2500. That’s twice the 50-sheet capacity of the iX1400 and five times the capacity of the Epson ES-C320W. The Brother ADS-4300N comes close with its 80-sheet ADF, while the Canon R40 Receipt Edition lags behind with its modest 60-sheet ADF.

The ADF capacity for any of these models will depend on the thickness and weight of the paper. (They’re usually rated for standard A4 pages.) If you plan to scan receipts, you’ll be happy to know that the iX2400 has the same Receipt Guide attachment that’s included with the iX2500. When using the attachment, though, the scanner's 100-sheet capacity drops to 50.

Also impressive given its lower price, the iX2400 matches the iX2500’s hefty peak daily duty cycle rating of 7,000 sheets. Paired with the iX2400’s large 100-sheet ADF, you would have to load and reload the ADF 70 times during the day to reach that maximum rating. By contrast, the ScanSnap iX1400 and Brother ADS-4300N have a peak daily duty cycle rating of 6,000 sheets. The Canon R40 Receipt Edition has a peak daily duty cycle of 4,000 sheets, while the Epson ES-C320W's rating is just 3,500 sheets.

Where the iX2400 makes a clear break with the iX2500 is by leaving out the latter's LCD screen and Wi-Fi connectivity: You can't use the unit as a standalone scanner, and you can only hook it up to a computer by USB. To get the beefier options, you’ll need to pay extra for a spiffier model like the iX2500. (The iX2400 doesn’t have an Ethernet port, either.)

(Credit: David English)

Still, many similar-priced models lack those features, too. The Brother ADS-4300N, Canon R40 Receipt Edition, Epson ES-C320W, and Ricoh ScanSnap iX1400 don’t have an LCD, either. And among that group, only the Epson ES-C320W has Wi-Fi connectivity. At the same time, you can save a significant amount of money if you know you’ll use the scanner only via USB. Case in point: The iX2400's list price is $90 lower than the iX2500's.

The advanced skew-detection system in the iX2400 and iX2500 was previously available only on Ricoh’s pricier business scanners. That system uses a brake roller to hold subsequent pages in place, while an ultrasonic sensor examines the current page for skew at its leading edge. If the system detects that the page is tilted, it will automatically halt the feed operation to prevent any damage.

Setup and Use: An Abundance of Templates

The unit comes with a printed Getting Started guide that takes you through the setup process. Using the provided link, you can download and install the ScanSnap Home and ABBYY FineReader for ScanSnap apps, along with the necessary drivers. You’ll also get a chance to upgrade the scanner’s firmware if it’s out of date.

(Credit: Ricoh)

The ScanSnap Home app lets you initiate a scan from your computer and route that scan to its destination. You can also use it to create profiles that group together various settings that you might want to use frequently, including Color Mode (Color, Gray, or B&W), Scanning Side (Duplex or Simplex), Image Quality (Normal, Better, Best, or Excellent), Rotation (with various angle options), and File Format (JPEG, PDF Single, or PDF Multiple). You can also put some of those settings to automatic, letting the software adjust them on its own.

(Credit: Ricoh)

ScanSnap Home includes a wide range of templates you can use as-is or customize to your specific needs. Some, like Business Cards and Business Trip Expenses, are designed for companies, but there's also a host of personal templates, like Photo Album, Postcards and Greeting Cards, and School Handout. You’ll also find a small section of cloud-service templates that work through the client applications for Dropbox, Evernote, Google Drive, iCloud Drive, and OneDrive. And, of course, you can create a template from scratch and include any of the elements from the pre-existing templates.

If you’ve used the versatile ABBYY FineReader app before, you won’t be surprised to see it here. To its credit, Ricoh has brought ABBYY's features directly into ScanSnap Home, instead of requiring you to switch to a separate app for the file conversions. To convert your scan to a Microsoft Office format, for instance, you can just right-click the graphic representation of your scanned document and select the “Send to” option that branches out to ABBYY Scan to Word, ABBYY Scan to Excel, and ABBYY Scan to PowerPoint.

While there’s still a separate ABBYY FineReader for ScanSnap app, you use it to change the settings related to converting scans to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and searchable PDF files. Once you have those settings just how you like them, you probably won’t have to come back to the standalone app.

(Credit: David English)

The removable Receipt Guide—similar to the one that ships with the ScanSnap iX1600 Receipt Edition—is a breeze to install and remove, and it attaches directly to the ADF paper chute. And it's a welcome addition: Receipts are usually smaller and thinner than typical business documents, so they can be a little tricky to scan, especially if you stack a bunch of them onto the ADF at the same time.

While the iX2400 isn’t designed to be used as a standalone scanner, it does have a scan button on the front of the unit. It proved useful just after I had loaded in a document to be scanned. Your computer will need to be turned on and ready to accept the scan over the USB connection, though you don’t need to have ScanSnap Home open for this to work. Once I had returned to my computer, I was able to add a title to the scan and save it to the default folder. It then appeared in ScanSnap Home, along with the other scans that I had initiated from within the app.

Speed and Performance Testing: Setting a Quick Pace

Ricoh gives the iX2400 a speed rating of 45 simplex (one-sided) pages per minute (ppm) or 90 two-sided (duplex) images per minute (ipm, where each page side is counted as an image). Those are the same rated speeds as the iX2500, and a notch faster than the 40ppm/80ipm ratings for the iX1400.

The iX2400's numbers also beat similar-priced document scanners like the Brother ADS-4300N and Canon R40 Receipt Edition (clocking in at 40ppm/80ipm), and the somewhat sluggish Epson ES-C320W (30ppm/60ipm).

That's what the iX2400 looks like on paper. To see if it could really match or even surpass the manufacturer ratings, I used the ScanSnap Home app to run some test scans. I hooked up the scanner to our Intel Core i5 testbed PC running Windows 10 Pro with a USB connection.

The iX2400 turned in a strong performance, significantly exceeding its official 45ppm/90ipm rating. It scanned our standard 25-page single-sided document at 51.6ppm and our 25-page (50-image) duplex document at 102.4ipm—very close to the results we got with the pricier iX2500 (51.2ppm simplex and 102.2ipm duplex). The iX2400’s scores easily beat the 42.1ppm/82.5ipm results from the Brother ADS-4300N, and the 42.4ppm/82.1ipm results from the Canon R40 Receipt Edition. The Epson ES-C320W wasn't even in the same league, at the 33.5ppm/66.7ipm.

What about scan quality? Almost any document scanner can convert printed pages to error-free, editable text down to 6 points in both our Arial (sans-serif) and Times New Roman (serif) font tests. The iX2400 easily surpassed that when I saved its text-based scanned documents to searchable PDFs using ABBYY, delivering accuracy down to 4 points with Arial and 5 points with Times New Roman. That's the same precision we saw with both the ScanSnap iX2500 and Epson ES-C320W, and better than the Brother ADS-4300N and Canon R40 Receipt Edition (6 points for both fonts). That said, you're unlikely to encounter text smaller than 10 points in most real-world business settings.

In short, the iX2400's lower price doesn't mean you'll get lower quality or consistency. I found its scans to be just as good as the flagship iX2500’s output: clean, with no stray dots or unexpected shadows. Scanned photos, meanwhile, delivered accurate colors with an appropriate amount of contrast and brightness. And I got no skewed results, crumpled sheets, or missing pages.