The 6 Best Price Guns
Updated by · How we research
We weighed six one-line and two-line pricing guns on characters, labels, ink rollers, build and warranty. The Monarch 1131 takes first place. When users buy our independently chosen editorial choices, we may earn commissions to help fund the Wiki.
Cheap copies of the MX-5500 price gun are widely sold, and owners report labels falling off and ink smearing. A price gun, or pricing labeler, prints a number on a small sticker and applies it with one squeeze of the trigger. Shops, flea-market sellers and stockrooms use them to mark prices, dates and codes, and labels in the common 1131 size are easy to find.
From the manual
- On a new roll, discard the first 10 inches of labels and liner; Uline's copy adds peeling off the first 12 labels to prevent jams. p. 3; Uline sheet, p. 1
- Never thread the label strip through any rollers. Feed it in, then squeeze the trigger about eight times until it exits the rear. p. 3
- The one-year warranty applies in the U.S. only and excludes accident, abuse and supplies that don't meet Monarch's specifications. p. 1
Why the Monarch 1131 is our top pick
Most shops only need a price on each label, and for that job the 1131 is the simpler tool: one row of eight bands to set, where our runner-up, the Monarch 1136, has two rows of eight.1,3 Each 1131 roll holds 2,500 labels against the 1136's 1,750, so it stops for reloading less often during a long pricing run.1,3
Its character key is laid out for pricing. Two bands carry FOR for multi-buy deals, two carry a cents sign, and the last band prints units such as LB, EACH, DOZ and PKG, or +TX.2 What that key can't print is a full MM/DD/YY date, because its slashes stop at the fifth band.2,6
The 1136 is the better buy when every label must carry two facts. Its top line has slashes in six of its eight bands, so a full date, a WAS price or an item code fits above the price, though that top line prints smaller, at 3 mm against the 5 mm price line.4,3 The two share one replacement ink roller,7 the same loading and cleaning steps5 and the same one-year warranty.5
| Monarch 1131 | Monarch 1136 | |
|---|---|---|
| Print lines | One, 8 characters | Two, 8 each |
| Bands to set | 8 | 16 |
| Labels per roll | 2,500 | 1,750 |
| MM/DD/YY date | No, standard key | Yes, top line |
| Warranty | One year | One year |
Sources
- Monarch 1131 11130 and 1131 product information, Avery Dennison (PDF), p. 2 2Instructions and character key, Uline H-991 (PDF), p. 3
- Monarch 1136 3Product information, Avery Dennison (PDF), p. 2 4Instructions and character key, Uline H-992 (PDF), p. 3
- Monarch 1130 series 5Operating instructions and warranty (PDF), pp. 1, 3–4
- Uline 6Monarch labeler comparison guide 7Monarch 1130, 1131 and 1136 replacement ink roller
From the manual
- Every top-line band carries digits and six carry a slash, so a full date such as 11/04/26 fits above the price. p. 3
- Top-line bands also print WAS, FOR, OFF and EA for markdowns, and the bottom line ends in a unit band with LB, DOZ or CASE. p. 3
- To clear a jam, lift the supply guide and pull out loose labels; the sheet marks where one drop of 100% silicone lubricant goes. p. 2
- After a roller change, push every printhead knob fully back before closing the cover, and set only characters on a white background. Monarch instructions, p. 2
Editor's Notes
November 4, 2026, by Ezvid Wiki Editors:
We read Monarch's operating instructions, Avery Dennison's spec sheets and Uline's instruction sheets for the 1131 and 1136, added notes from them under both picks and a section on why the 1131 leads. We corrected the Perco Lite and Perco Plus details from Perco's own store, made clear that a lettered version of the 1136 exists, and softened the Motex letter claim, which only its seller makes. We found no manuals for the Perco, Motex or Towa guns.
October 15, 2026, by Ezvid Wiki Editors:
Labels for the Monarch 1131 are sold everywhere, and it's the simplest, best-documented gun here, so it heads the list. The 2021 list had drifted. The Kenco Premium Kit is no longer available, we couldn't confirm the Garvey 1910 is still sold new, and the Meto 15.22 Pack now costs about twice as much as a Monarch with very little owner feedback behind it. The Perco 1-Line Kit listing turned into a pricier model, and the Super Z Outlet Numerical is one of many cheap MX-5500 copies, which draw owner reports of labels falling off and smeared ink. We also moved the BS One Tagging Gun out of the ranking, since it attaches hang tags rather than printing prices. The buyer's guide covers tag attachers now.
The Monarch 1136 stays for anyone who needs two lines, and the Towa GS275 stays as the metal-framed option.
New are the Perco Lite, a cheap starter kit, the Perco Plus, a bigger kit with a long listed warranty, and the Motex MX-2316, which prints letters.
A few readers ask about digital price guns. Those are really small thermal label printers, and the guide explains how they differ.
Be aware that evidence here is thin. We found no independent tests of price guns, and several maker pages wouldn't load for us. Our sources are the spec pages that did load, a Monarch dealer, labeling-supply dealers, owner reports of sticking number wheels and labels that won't stay put, and a recall check. We say in each entry where a fact comes only from the seller.
Earlier notes
June 18, 2021, by Christopher Thomas:
We removed the XL Pro 25EEA because it's now remarkably difficult to get your hands on. Instead, we've added the BS One Tagging Gun, which is designed to fix price tags to soft items using a needle and thin plastic connectors that loop through cardboard tags. This one, of course, doesn't actually print any tags. For traditional printers, we still recommend the Monarch 1136, although the Garvey 1910 is notably less expensive and doesn't weigh as much.
January 21, 2020, by Kaivaan Kermani:
There are a couple of brands I like to see in any top price gun list, with the top two being Monarch and XL Pro. Both these brands make some of the best labelers around, and at least one model from each brand is worthy of a top-five spot. There are a lot of good options to choose from under both brands, but eventually, I decided to settle on the Monarch 1136 (which is a popular two-line model that complements the single-line Monarch Pricemarker 1131 already listed), and the XL Pro 25EEA. Of course, with both models, you can purchase value packs which include label rolls and ink rolls, but the options for these models looked very expensive, so I thought I'd leave it up to you to decide about add-ons.
Some other second-tier price gun manufacturers that are usually worth a mention or with at least one model are Meto, Garvey and to a lesser extent Towa - I believe that Towa makes all of their models from metal, so they're quite hardy and tough. [2026 update: Towa dealers describe steel side plates and a steel frame, with some plastic parts, rather than an all-metal body.] Since the Towa GS275 and Garvey 1910 - two good options - were already listed prior to the update, I decided to include the Meto 15.22 Pack. Now, I could have added the Meto 15.22 standalone model, but I thought that the value pack was actually good value for money here.
I also wanted to include some two-line labelers, since all the models from before the update, with the exception of the Kenco Premium Kit, were single-line labelers. There are advantages to both types, with single-line labelers having a faster, smoother operation - dialing on the two-line models is a little bit fiddly and takes more time, but their advantage is obviously in the amount of character space you get with two lines and 15+ characters. All three new models I've included are two-line labelers. Three-line labelers also exist nowadays (I know that Monarch and Meto have three-line models), but I haven't included any since I personally don't think they're worth it - they're even more fiddly, and the labels are too big, and plus you can convey ample information in two lines.
Special Honors
Avery Dennison Monarch Supplies Avery Dennison, which makes Monarch labelers, sells genuine labels and ink rollers for the 1131 and 1136 through its own store, including removable labels and FREEZX freezer-grade food labels. It's the place to match a label to an older Monarch gun and to find the maker's current models. shopids.averydennison.com
One Line Or Two, And How Many Characters
A two-line gun fits a price plus a date, department or item code on one label.
Start with what each label has to say. A one-line gun prints a price or a short code, and it's the quickest to set because there's only one band of wheels to turn. The Monarch 1131 prints one line of up to eight characters on a label about 0.44 by 0.78 inches. Some one-line guns hold fewer: American Retail Supply sells one-line models with five or six characters (American Retail Supply), and the Towa GS275 prints six digits.
A two-line gun fits a price plus a date, department or item code on one label. The Monarch 1136 holds eight characters per line, with smaller type on top (3 millimeters) and larger type for the price below (5 millimeters). Each extra band means more dials to set, so two-line guns are slower for big runs of the same price.
Check whether you need letters. Most bands carry digits plus a few symbols and preset words. Monarch's character keys include a currency sign, a decimal point, slashes and dashes for dates, and words such as FOR, WAS, OFF, EACH and LB (Uline Monarch 1136 instructions). The standard Monarch 1136 has no alphabet band. If you want words like SALE or a short product name, Monarch also sells an alpha version of the 1136 whose top line prints letters (Uline). Three-line labelers exist too, such as Monarch's 1153, and past that a label printer is the better tool.
Labels And Ink Rollers: The Part You Keep Buying
A price gun only works with labels cut to its size, so check what a gun takes before you buy it. Label sizes differ between models: Monarch 1131 labels are about 0.44 by 0.78 inches, 1136 labels about 0.65 by 0.78 inches, and Towa GS275 labels 13/16 by 15/32 inch. Monarch's maker, Avery Dennison, sells labels with general-purpose permanent adhesive, removable labels that peel off cleanly at room temperature, and freezer-grade food labels (Avery Dennison). Many other brands, Perco among them, sell labels sized for Monarch guns, often with security slits that tear if a shopper tries to move a label.
Ink rollers dry out and need replacing, and they're model-specific too. American Retail Supply notes that one-line guns generally need a different inker than two-line guns. Monarch is an exception: one replacement roller fits the 1130, 1131 and 1136, and Uline lists a two-year shelf life for it (Uline). Keep a spare, and store rollers sealed. If you buy third-party labels, make sure they're cut to the gun's exact size: Monarch's warranty doesn't cover trouble caused by supplies that don't meet its specifications (Monarch operating instructions).
The cheapest guns are generic copies of the MX-5500 design, sold under many brand names. In a small-business forum thread, an owner described a cheap MX-5500 whose labels dried out and fell off and whose ink smeared (Reddit r/smallbusiness), and owners of one widely sold generic MX-5500 report the plastic part that holds the ink roller breaking early. Spending a little more on an established brand buys more reliable supplies as well as a better gun.
Digital Price Guns And Tag Attachers
Price guns are fully mechanical, with no batteries or electronics. When people search for a digital or electronic price gun, the tool they usually mean is a pocket thermal label printer, such as the NIIMBOT D110. It's about 3.9 by 3 inches, pairs with a phone app over Bluetooth, and prints text, symbols and barcodes at 203 dpi on heat-sensitive labels roughly 12 to 15 millimeters wide (B&H). There's no ink roller to replace, and you can print any wording you like. The tradeoffs: you design each label on your phone, the printer needs charging, it uses the maker's own label rolls, and it's slower than squeezing a trigger down a shelf of cans. A label printer suits varied labels such as shelf tags, storage bins and long product names, while a price gun suits fast, repeated pricing.
Clothing and other soft goods are a different job. A tagging gun, or tag attacher, pushes a small plastic barb through fabric to hang a printed or handwritten tag, and it prints nothing itself. Its needle is sharp, so keep the guard on when it's not in use.
We checked each brand on this list in the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission's database and found no recalls (CPSC).
How we researched this
We compared 17 price guns, tag attachers and label printers and narrowed them to six. For the two Monarchs we read Monarch's 1130-series operating instructions, Avery Dennison's spec sheets for the 1130/1131, the FreshMarx 1131 and the 1136, and Uline's H-991 and H-992 instruction sheets with their character keys. Perco, Motex and Towa publish no model manuals we could find, so those entries rest on Perco's own store pages, the Towa dealer pricegun.com and Motex dealers in Europe and Asia. Searches of the CPSC recall database and Health Canada's recall site on November 4, 2026 found no price-gun recalls for any of these brands.
Sources (16)
- Avery Dennison: Monarch 1131 labeler
- Avery Dennison: Monarch 1131 FREEZX food prep labels
- Reddit r/smallbusiness: favorite pricing gun
- CPSC recalls
- Monarch: 1130-series labeler operating instructions (PDF)
- Avery Dennison: Monarch 1130 and 1131 product information (PDF)
- Avery Dennison: Monarch FreshMarx 1131 product information (PDF)
- Avery Dennison: Monarch 1136 product information (PDF)
- Uline: Monarch 1131 instructions, H-991 (PDF)
- Uline: Monarch 1136 instructions, H-992 (PDF)
- Uline: Monarch labeler comparison guide
- Uline: Monarch 1130, 1131 and 1136 replacement ink roller
- Perco: Perco Lite price gun kit
- Perco: Perco Plus price gun kit
- pricegun.com: Towa price guns
- Health Canada: recalls and safety alerts
Frequently asked questions
What is the best price gun for a retail store?
For most shops, a Monarch 1131. It prints one line of eight characters, carries a one-year warranty, and its labels and ink rollers are sold by many suppliers. Choose the Monarch 1136 if you need a second line for dates or codes.
Should I get a one-line or a two-line price gun?
One line is enough for prices and is quicker to set. Two lines fit a price plus a date, department or item code on each label, but setting two bands takes longer.
Is there a digital or electronic price gun?
Not really. Price guns are mechanical. The closest electronic tool is a small Bluetooth thermal label printer, such as the NIIMBOT D110, which prints any text or a barcode from a phone app but is slower for repeat pricing.
Do price gun labels and ink rollers fit every gun?
No. Labels are cut to each model's size, and rollers are model-specific. Check the gun's label size before buying. Monarch's 1131 and 1136 share one ink roller.
Can a price gun print dates?
Some can. The standard Monarch 1136 prints a full MM/DD/YY date on its top line, above the price. The standard numeric 1131 can't, but Monarch's Date/Numeric version of the 1131 can.
Why do cheap price gun labels fall off?
Owner reports about cheap generic kits point to bundled labels whose adhesive has dried out. Fresh labels with the right adhesive (permanent, removable or freezer) from an established supplier are the first thing to try.
