How to Print Coloring Pages at Home

You found a cute page, you hit print, and it came out tiny and off-center with weird margins. Been there. Printing coloring pages at home is genuinely easy once you know four or five settings, and then every page comes out clean and the right size. Here is the whole thing.

Step 1: Open the PDF, not the preview

Download the page as a PDF and open it in a real PDF reader (the free Adobe Acrobat Reader, Preview on a Mac, or your browser's built-in viewer). Printing straight from a thumbnail or an email preview is where a lot of the sizing problems start. The PDF holds the correct dimensions, so let it do the work.

Step 2: Set scaling to "Actual Size" (this is the big one)

In the print dialog, find the Scale or Page Sizing option and choose Actual Size or 100%.

Avoid "Fit to Page" or "Shrink to Fit" unless something is genuinely getting cut off. Those settings quietly resize the design and that is what gives you tiny art floating in fat white margins. Actual Size prints the page exactly as it was drawn.

If a sliver does get clipped at the edges, then and only then switch to "Fit" to pull it back in. Most well-made pages (mine included) are sized to print cleanly at 100%.

Step 3: Match the paper size to the paper in your tray

Pick US Letter (8.5 x 11 in) or A4 (8.3 x 11.7 in) in the print menu, and make sure that is the same paper actually loaded in your printer.

This is the fix for the classic "half the image is missing" problem. If your dialog says Letter but A4 is in the tray (or the reverse), the printer crops it. My pages are set up to sit nicely on both Letter and A4, so just choose whichever you have.

Step 4: Print single sided

Turn off two-sided / duplex printing. Single sided keeps the back of every page blank, which matters for two reasons: markers can bleed through to whatever is behind, and even colored pencils leave a faint imprint. A blank back means you never lose a design.

Step 5: Choose the right paper for your medium

This is where the page goes from "fine" to "lovely."

• Colored pencils or crayons: standard printer paper (around 75 to 90 gsm, or 20 to 24 lb) is perfectly good. No need to buy anything special.
• Markers: reach for heavier paper, roughly 90 to 120 gsm, sometimes sold as "presentation paper" or light cardstock. It soaks up less ink, so colors stay crisp and bleed-through drops way off.
• Alcohol markers specifically: go heavier still, or slip a scrap sheet behind the page. Those inks travel.

If markers and bleed-through are your worry, I wrote a whole guide on the best markers for coloring books and the trick that stops bleed cold. Still deciding on a medium at all? Here is colored pencils vs markers.

Step 6: Bump the print quality and save ink

Set the print quality to Best or High for crisp outlines. Coloring pages are mostly line art, so this barely uses more ink but makes the lines noticeably cleaner.

To save color ink, print in grayscale or black and white. The page is just outlines anyway, you are the one adding the color. This also keeps the lines a true, even black.

A quick pre-print checklist

Before you hit print, glance at the preview and confirm:

1. Scaling says Actual Size / 100%.
2. Paper size matches what is in the tray (Letter or A4).
3. Single sided is on (duplex off).
4. Quality is High, color set to grayscale to save ink.

Thirty seconds of checking and the page comes out right the first time, every time.

Now grab some pages to print

If you want pages that are already sized and drawn to print cleanly at home, I keep a free set of hand drawn kawaii designs you can download and print in a minute. Bold outlines so markers behave, big friendly shapes, single sided ready. Grab the free pages here. There is a free sushi set too if you want something savory and cute.

And if printing one at a time gets old, my book World Desserts: A Kawaii Journey is 30-plus of these scenes already printed single sided on the good paper, no printer required. Need ideas for what to color? Here are cute things to color when you're stressed.

Print one tonight, line up your markers, and color something cute. That is the whole reward.

Happy coloring,
Emma