On this page 7 sections
A PDF for printing only has to get six things right. The page matches the finished size (plus 3 mm of bleed round the edge for rigid signs, boards and anything on paper). Fonts travel inside the file or become outlines. Photos carry enough pixels. Colours are CMYK when your software lets you choose. And each design gets its own page, in the right order. Everything else in the export box can stay on its default, and a file like that sails through the free check a person gives every upload.
Why PDF, and not the design file itself? #
A PDF freezes the layout. Fonts, spacing and pictures stay put, whichever computer opens it next. The format is an international standard, ISO 32000, so it displays identically on your laptop, on ours and at the press.
Other formats are fine too. We’re happy with AI, EPS or SVG, and with big, sharp JPG, PNG or TIFF photos. The uploader takes PDF, AI, EPS, SVG, PNG, JPG, TIF, PSD, DOCX and ZIP. If you’ve designed in Word, PowerPoint or Canva, that’s no problem, but exporting a top-quality PDF before you send locks the layout down.
The six settings for a PDF for printing #
| Setting | Get it to | Skip it and |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Page size | What you ordered. An A5 flyer is 148 × 210 mm, which becomes 154 × 216 mm once bleed is on | The design gets stretched or cropped to fit |
| 2. Bleed | 3 mm on all four edges for rigid boards, signs and paper. None on banners or roller banners, which rely on safe margins | Thin white edges can appear after cutting |
| 3. Fonts | Carried inside the file, or turned into outlines | A font we don’t have gets substituted and your lines reflow |
| 4. Images | Around 300 dpi at finished size on little things; 100 to 150 on big banners | Photos and logos print soft |
| 5. Colour | CMYK where offered, and the Pantone number for any brand colour | RGB is converted, and very bright colours can dull slightly |
| 6. Pages | A page for each design: front, then back | We have to ask which page is which |
Each has its own guide if you want the detail: print bleed, image resolution for print and RGB to CMYK.
The order of work #
Menus get renamed between versions and subscription tiers, so follow this sequence and look for whatever your program calls the same thing.
- Size the page first. Set the finished size before designing anything, not at the end. Where bleed applies, add 3 mm all round.
- Push backgrounds out, pull words in. Colour and photos run into the bleed. Words and logos sit inside the safe area: at least 10 mm in from the cut on a sign, and a full 50 mm in on a banner with hems.
- Use the real images. Place the original photo and logo files, never copies saved off a website or out of a chat.
- Sort the fonts. Either allow embedding on export, or outline the text. Keep an editable version first, because outlined words are fixed for good.
- Pick a print-quality export. Choose the best-quality PDF setting on offer and switch bleed on if you added it.
- Open the result and look. Confirm the dimensions, magnify pictures and lettering, and count the pages.
Where the settings hide in common programs #
Canva
From the download menu, pick the print version of PDF (called “PDF Print” at the time of writing), not “PDF Standard”. Tick the bleed box if the design uses bleed. Some plans also offer CMYK here; without it, send the RGB version and we’ll convert it.
Word and PowerPoint
Choose the page or slide dimensions before you begin. There’s no bleed option in Word, so add 6 mm to the width and height yourself and keep text well away from the edge. When you save as PDF, choose the higher quality or print option over the smallest file. Then read the PDF through, because a font that won’t embed is sometimes quietly replaced.
Adobe InDesign and Illustrator
Type the bleed into document setup. On export, begin with the “High Quality Print” or “Press Quality” preset, go to the Marks and Bleeds panel and tell it to use the bleed from the document. To outline lettering in Illustrator, use Type, then Create Outlines, on a duplicate.
Affinity Designer and Publisher
Bleed lives in document setup. When exporting, pick one of the print presets, “PDF (for print)” or “PDF (press ready)”, and make sure bleed is switched on.
Checking a PDF for printing before you send it #
Open the file and find its properties window. Dimensions should equal the finished size plus bleed, so an A4 sign reads 216 × 303 mm. Acrobat Reader has a Fonts tab in there that shows whether each one is embedded. Next, zoom every photo and logo to 200%: if edges look jagged there, expect a fuzzy result. Finally, read each phone number, email and website aloud. What you send is what we print, typos and all.
Banners and other big items #
For banners, roller banners and hoardings, the PDF can be full size, say 6 ft × 3 ft (1829 × 914 mm), or drawn to an exact scale like 1:10, as long as the shape matches your order. Leave off bleed. Keep lettering 50 mm clear of each edge instead, and nothing important in the bottom 150 to 200 mm of a roller banner. Our guide to 1:10 scale artwork walks through the maths.
Uploading it, or letting the designer make it #
Under Artwork on the product page, choose the option to upload your own print-ready file. Three files can go in, each up to 25 MB, or send it later: we email you once the order is placed. Someone checks every file for free, looking at resolution, dimensions and bleed, and gets in touch if anything needs sorting. Bigger files? See what to do when your artwork file is too large.
No design program at all? Where a product has the online designer, as flyers and business cards do, it builds the PDF for printing for you: right size, bleed on, text outlined. You get it with the printed job, or you can buy the file by itself. Prefer to hand the whole lot over? The paid artwork and design service does the setup, with 1 design and 2 rounds of changes included.