Scans come out blank, black or all white

On the glass, the side you want scanned faces down, lined up with the arrow or mark in the corner. In the document feeder, many models want pages face up, but check the small icon beside the feeder. Remove staples and sticky notes.

An open lid can turn the background black and confuse auto-cropping. Close it fully, or for thick books press it down gently and check with a preview.

Copy the page on the printer. A good copy means the scanner works and the problem is in your computer's scan settings; a blank or black copy means the scanner hardware is at fault.

Lift the lid slightly during a copy and watch for a light bar moving under the glass, without staring into it. No light, or a dim or flickering one, points to a lamp or sensor fault.

Some standalone flatbed scanners have a shipping lock switch underneath or on the side; while locked, the scan head can't move. Most all-in-one printers don't have one, so check your manual.

In the Windows Scan app, click Show more and set Color mode to Color or Grayscale. Black and white mode can turn faint text or photos completely white. Click Preview before scanning.

Make sure Source matches where your document is, flatbed or feeder. Scanning from the feeder while the page sits on the glass gives a blank result.

In the maker's scan app, set brightness and contrast back to the middle or default, and turn off threshold, background removal or document enhancement options as a test.

In Image Capture, select the scanner and click Show Details. Set Kind to Color or Black & White rather than Text, which can turn faint pages white or dark ones black.

If Image Correction is set to Manual, switch it to None to undo any extreme brightness or threshold values.

Choose the flatbed or document feeder option to match where your page is, and drag the scan area in the preview so it covers the whole page.