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Poster Tiler (Big Picture on Many Pages)

Print a big poster on ordinary paper: tiles with overlap, crop marks and an assembly map.

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Most printers cannot print the outer 3–6 mm.

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Try an example: 60 cm poster plan for a 4000 × 3000 photo · One-metre portrait poster on Letter paper

More about this tool

How it works

Enlarge a JPEG or PNG to a poster of any width and split it over A4, Letter or other sheets with overlap, trim lines, crop marks, alignment crosses and tile names, plus a cover page with the assembly map, the effective resolution and a test square. Without an image you get the tiling plan.

  • Printable area = paper − 2 × margin; each next sheet starts one step = printable − overlap further, so neighbouring sheets share the overlap strip. Sheets across = ceil((poster − overlap) / step); with “fewest sheets” both orientations are tried.
  • The image is embedded once (JPEG unchanged, PNG losslessly compressed) and every sheet shows its part through a clipping rectangle, so the PDF stays small and keeps the full resolution.
  • Effective resolution = image pixels ÷ poster inches (Lumina’s print planner gives the matching print size table). Below about 100 pixels per inch prints look soft up close.

Printers differ slightly in scale and margins: print the cover page first and measure the 50 mm test square. Interlaced PNG and CMYK JPEG files are not supported.

Sources

Part of Printshop

  • Printshop Printables studio

    QR codes, calendars, labels, graph paper and posters — print-perfect PDFs in seconds.

    Open Printshop

Related tools

How to use the Poster Tiler (Big Picture on Many Pages)

Enlarge an image across many A4 or Letter sheets with overlap, crop marks, tile names and an assembly page, and see the resolution you will get.

What it is for

You want a big poster but only have an office printer. The tool cuts an image into tiles that fit your paper, adds an overlap strip for gluing, crop marks and tile names, and puts an assembly map with a test square on the first page. It tells you the effective resolution, so you know before printing whether the photo will look sharp.

It accepts JPEG and PNG uploads. Without an upload you can plan with the pixel size alone: the PDF then shows grey placeholders. It does not do bleed, CMYK or professional print preparation.

Worked example

We planned a 600 mm wide poster from a 4000 × 3000 pixel photo on A4 with an 8 mm printer margin and 10 mm overlap. The poster is 600 × 450 mm and needs 8 sheets in 4 columns × 2 rows, portrait. The effective resolution is about 169 pixels per inch — sharp enough to look at from close up. The tile table shows each sheet's position: tile A2 starts 184 mm from the left edge, because each step is the printable width (194 mm) minus the overlap.

A bigger plan — a 3000 × 4500 pixel image at 1000 mm wide on US Letter with 15 mm overlap — becomes 1000 × 1500 mm on 36 sheets (6 × 6). The tool warns that 76 pixels per inch will look soft up close; it is fine for a poster seen from a few metres.

How to read the result

  • Sheets and Columns × rows: how many pages you print. The orientation was chosen to need the fewest sheets unless you fixed it.
  • Poster width and height: the final size; the height follows the image's aspect ratio.
  • Effective resolution: image pixels per inch on the poster. Above about 150 looks sharp at reading distance; below 100 you get a warning.
  • Tiles: name, position and size of every tile on the poster, in millimetres.
  • Files: the PDF (cover page and tiles), plus SVG and PNG of the first page. Open in the app opens the plan in Printshop; the image is not part of that link.

Tips and common mistakes

  • Print at 100 % — "fit to page" breaks the overlap and the crosses will not meet.
  • Measure your printer's real unprintable border and set the margin a little larger.
  • 10 mm overlap is plenty for glue; more overlap means more sheets.
  • Trim the left and top edges of each tile along the dashed line and glue it over its neighbour so that the crosses meet; start at A1.
  • Thicker paper (100–120 g/m²) wrinkles less with glue.
  • Very large photos make large PDFs; a JPEG at 150–200 ppi of the final size is enough.

FAQ

What does "Fewest sheets" do?

It tries portrait and landscape sheets and keeps the one that needs fewer pages; on a tie it keeps portrait.

My image is a HEIC or WebP. Can I use it?

The tool takes JPEG and PNG. The Printshop app converts other formats your browser can open.

How sharp will the print be?

That is the effective resolution in the result: 150 ppi and more looks sharp up close, 100 ppi is fine at a metre, less only from further away.

Can I tile a PDF?

No, the tool tiles images. Export the PDF page as an image first.

Guide last updated:

For scripts and AI agents

  • JSON API: POST https://printshoppostertiler.usefulweb.app/api/v1/calculate (same calculation as this page)
  • Interface description: OpenAPI 3.1 · AI guide: llms.txt
  • MCP server (Streamable HTTP): https://printshoppostertiler.usefulweb.app/mcp · tool name printshop_poster_tiler
Example request
curl -s -X POST https://printshoppostertiler.usefulweb.app/api/v1/calculate \
  -H 'content-type: application/json' \
  -d '{"imageWidth":4000,"imageHeight":3000,"width":600}'
Feedback · ideas & bug reports welcome