Business Card Generator

How to use the business card generator

1. Fill in the details you want on the card.
2. Choose a size, and set the bleed and safe margin your printer asks for.
3. Export the PDF and send it as it is — do not trim it yourself.

About this tool

Most card generators produce an image at the finished size, which is the one thing a printer cannot use. A press needs the artwork larger than the card, with the design continuing past the trim line, because a guillotine is accurate to about a millimetre and a stack shifts as it is cut. Without that margin some copies come back with a white hairline along one edge.

So this exports at the document size — the card plus bleed on every side — with crop marks in the bleed showing where to cut. The accent bar deliberately runs off the edge of the preview for the same reason. Text stays inside a safe margin, which is the same tolerance applied inwards: a name three millimetres from the trim looks fine on screen and alarming on the copies that cut short.

The sizes offered are the real ones. 85 × 55 mm is the UK and European standard; the US card is 3.5 × 2 inches, which is 88.9 × 50.8 mm — wider and shorter, so a design laid out for one does not fit the other. A card that has to work in both markets is usually designed to the smaller area.

The output uses the fonts built into the PDF standard, so the file stays small and renders identically anywhere. That is a deliberate limit rather than an oversight: a card set in a brand typeface needs that font embedded, which means a licence to embed it, and a generator that quietly embedded one would be handing you a licensing problem along with the PDF.

Common uses

• Producing a card for a printer without opening design software.
• Making a consistent card for everyone in a small team.
• Checking how much text actually fits inside the safe area.

Frequently asked questions

What is bleed and why does the PDF look too big?

Bleed is artwork extending past the trim line so that cutting never exposes white paper. The document is intentionally larger than the card, and the crop marks show where it gets cut.

What size is a business card?

85 × 55 mm in the UK and Europe, and 3.5 × 2 inches — 88.9 × 50.8 mm — in the US. They are different enough that one layout does not fit both.

Can I use my own font?

Not here. Embedding a typeface requires a licence to embed it, and a generator that did so quietly would hand you a licensing problem with the file.