Calendar paper sizes: Letter, Legal, Tabloid, A4, A3 and 12 × 12
US Letter for North America, A4 for nearly everywhere else, and larger sheets from a copy shop for a wall.
For a calendar printed at home, use the paper your printer already holds: US Letter (8.5 × 11 inches) in the US, Canada and parts of Latin America, and A4 (210 × 297 mm) almost everywhere else. Both fit every home printer. Legal is longer and suits a month with room for notes; Tabloid (11 × 17 inches) and A3 make a proper wall calendar but need a wide-format printer or a copy shop.
The sizes in the maker
| Paper | Inches | Millimeters | Points | Home printer? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US Letter | 8.5 × 11 | 215.9 × 279.4 | 612 × 792 | Yes |
| US Legal | 8.5 × 14 | 215.9 × 355.6 | 612 × 1008 | Most |
| Tabloid (Ledger) | 11 × 17 | 279.4 × 431.8 | 792 × 1224 | Wide-format only |
| A4 | 8.27 × 11.69 | 210 × 297 | 595 × 842 | Yes |
| A3 | 11.69 × 16.54 | 297 × 420 | 842 × 1191 | Wide-format only |
| A5 | 5.83 × 8.27 | 148 × 210 | 420 × 595 | Yes, with the tray set for A5 |
| Square | 12 × 12 | 304.8 × 304.8 | 864 × 864 | No; a print shop |
Points are the unit PDF files use, 72 to the inch. Landscape simply swaps the two numbers.
Letter and A4 are not the same
A4 is 6 mm narrower and 18 mm taller than Letter (about a quarter of an inch and three quarters of an inch). A calendar made for one and printed on the other is either cut off at the edges or shrunk by the printer to fit, which changes the margins. Choose the paper you will actually print on before you download the PDF; if you send the calendar to someone in another country, make a second copy in their size.
The A sizes halve each time: an A3 sheet folded in half is A4, and A4 folded is A5. Every A size has the same proportions (1 : 1.414), so an A4 calendar can be enlarged to A3 at a copy shop without changing the layout. Letter, Legal and Tabloid do not share proportions in the same way: Tabloid is two Letter sheets side by side.
Sizes of shop-bought calendars
Store and print-service wall calendars are usually 8.5 × 11 inches (opening to 11 × 17 with the picture above), 11 × 14 or 12 × 12 inches (opening to 12 × 24), with 9 × 12 as a premium size; desk calendars are smaller, such as 4 × 8 inches. In Europe, A4 and A3 wall calendars are the common sizes. To make a calendar that hangs like a bought one, print it in portrait on Letter or A4 with a photo above every month, or on Tabloid or A3 for a large kitchen calendar.
Which size for which calendar
| Calendar | Paper |
|---|---|
| Month to write in, on a fridge or in a binder | Letter or A4, landscape |
| Photo wall calendar | Letter or A4 portrait; Tabloid or A3 for a big one |
| Whole year on one page | Letter or A4; Tabloid or A3 for a wall |
| Year planner for an office | Tabloid or A3, landscape |
| Desk or planner insert | A5, or Letter cut in half |
| Family calendar with many columns | Legal or A3 |
Every page in the maker keeps a 0.42 inch (10.6 mm) margin, which home printers can print to; borderless printing is not needed. See printing a calendar for the printer settings.