PDF preflight guide

PDF page size for printing

A PDF can look correct on screen while carrying the wrong physical page dimensions for the intended print job.

PDF units

PDF page dimensions are stored in points, where 72 points equal one inch. A checker can convert those values to inches, millimetres and standard paper names.

Mixed pages

Scanned, merged or assembled PDFs can contain pages with different dimensions. A print workflow may scale, crop or switch paper unexpectedly when it encounters them.

Page boxes and bleed

Professional PDFs may include MediaBox, CropBox, TrimBox and BleedBox values. The first version of PrintSpecLab reports visible page dimensions; always follow the printer's preflight specification for production work.