How to Print a Booklet

Use this when you already have a multi-page PDF—a zine, a class pack, a program, a small catalog—and you want a folded booklet, not a stack of single-sided leaves. Saddle stitch means the sheets nest, you fold once, and you staple through the fold. It is the right bind for short books. It is the wrong bind for a 200-page novel.

Home printers can do this if you impose first. Imposition is the mapping from reader order to sheet order. If you skip it and hit your printer’s “booklet” checkbox on an already imposed file, pages shuffle twice and the job is waste paper.

You need a duplex printer or the patience to flip by hand, paper that folds without cracking (80–120 gsm is typical), and a long-reach stapler or a saddle stapler. For a thick booklet, test one signature before you commit the whole ream. Card covers are optional; this tool treats page 1 as the cover through the standard formula, not a separate cover plate.

Open the PDF booklet maker. Drop the file. Processing stays in the browser. If the page count is not a multiple of four, blank pages are added at the end and named in the banner. Choose Auto paper to keep source size, or A4 / Letter landscape if your printer cannot take a 2-up sheet of the original. Set a per-side gutter if type sits too close to the staple. Add total creep for thick stacks so inner sheets do not look like they drift toward the trim.

Export PDF, print quality. The download is yourfile-booklet.pdf. That file’s page 1 is sheet 0 front, page 2 is sheet 0 back, and so on, outer sheet first.

Print double-sided. For a landscape sheet with two pages side by side, choose Flip on long edge. Print at 100% / actual size — do not “fit to page.” Do not enable your printer’s own booklet mode. Keep the PDF’s colors unless you want a cheaper grayscale proof from the printer dialog.

If the back comes out upside down, your machine is flipping on the short edge. Either switch to long-edge flip or turn on Rotate back pages 180° and export again.

Keep the printed stack in order. Do not reshuffle. Fold all sheets together as one signature. Jog the head. Staple on the fold, two or three staples for a letter-size booklet. Trim the fore-edge only if you planned bleed and you have a cutter. For a home job, a bone folder and a long-reach stapler are enough.

Back upside down: wrong flip edge. Pages reading 1, 8, 7, 2: you printed as simplex or the stack was turned. Type in the staple: raise gutter. Outer pages look tighter at the trim than inner pages: raise total creep. Printer scaled the sheet: disable fit-to-page. These are geometry problems. This site is not a RIP and will not fix ICC profiles or spot colors.