Print Jobs Stuck in Queue? How to Clear Your Printer Spooler (Windows & Mac)

You hit “Print,” but nothing happens. No sounds, no paper movement, just a job sitting in your queue, refusing to budge. Welcome to one of the most common printing headaches: stuck print jobs.

The good news? You can usually fix this in a couple of minutes by clearing your print queue (or, on Windows, restarting the spooler).

Here’s how to get your printer unstuck fast.

Why Print Jobs Get Stuck

Before we fix it, here’s what typically causes the issue:

• A corrupted print job
• A job sent to the wrong printer
• Wireless communication drop
• A paused or offline spooler
• A partial driver update
• An interrupted printing attempt

Now let’s clear things out.

1. How to Clear the Print Queue (Windows)

A. Clear the queue from the interface

1. Open Control Panel → Devices and Printers
2. Right-click your printer → See what’s printing
3. Click Printer → Cancel All Documents

If everything disappears, try printing again.

B. If that doesn’t work: restart the Print Spooler

This is the step most tech forums recommend because it solves the majority of stubborn jobs.

1. Press Win + R, type services.msc, press Enter
2. Scroll to Print Spooler
3. Right-click → Restart

This forces Windows to rebuild the internal print pipeline.

C. If it still doesn’t work: manually flush the spooler

(Advanced but useful.)

1. Stop the Print Spooler (same steps as above)
2. Open File Explorer and go to: C:\Windows\System32\spool\PRINTERS
3. Delete everything inside the folder
4. Start the Print Spooler again

This clears corrupt jobs the UI can’t remove.

2. How to Clear the Print Queue (macOS)

A. Cancel from the queue window

1. Open System Settings → Printers & Scanners
2. Select your printer
3. Click Open Print Queue
4. Cancel any stuck jobs

B. Reset the printing system (powerful fix)

If the queue won’t clear:

1. In Printers & Scanners, right-click in the printer list
2. Choose Reset printing system
3. Re-add your printer

This wipes out old jobs, drivers, and settings, this will fix it most of the time. 

3. When Jobs Keep Getting Stuck

If the problem returns repeatedly, it usually points to one of these:

• Your printer is disconnecting from Wi-Fi
• You have duplicate printers in your system
• Your driver is outdated or partially corrupted
• The printer’s internal memory is full or glitching
• Your spooler service is crashing

If you’re seeing this more than once a month, it’s not you — it’s the printer.

Skip the spooler, skip the queue.

You don’t need to troubleshoot a whole subsystem just to print a document.

Upload your file to Have It Printed, and we’ll print it, mail it, and send tracking with no queues, no spoolers, no surprises.