Envelopes / #10 envelope
No. 10 envelope PDF size and window position
The #10 envelope is 9.5 by 4.125 inches and it is the standard business envelope in the United States, taking a Letter sheet folded in three.
The dimensions
One measurement in four units. Millimetres and inches are what a printer works in; points are what the PDF itself stores; pixels are only useful for checking a screen mock-up against the real thing.
- Millimetres: 241.3 x 104.8 mm
- Inches: 9.5 x 4.13 in
- Points: 684 x 297 pt
- CSS pixels: 912 x 396 px at 96 dpi
Where the size comes from
Like DL, the size follows from the sheet it carries: an 11 inch Letter page folded into three panels is about 3.67 inches deep, and the envelope adds clearance. The window, where present, is standardised at 4.5 by 1.125 inches positioned 0.875 inch from the left and 0.5 inch from the bottom, which is the specification most window envelope stock is cut to.
What gets printed at this size
- US business correspondence, invoices and cheques
- statement mailing at volume, where window envelopes remove a printing step
- remittance and return envelopes
Margins that survive a real printer
0.375 inch all round, with the top right 2.25 by 1 inch clear for postage or an indicia. Postal automation reads the address block, and anything printed inside the address clear zone lowers the chance the piece is machine sorted, which changes what it costs to send.
The CSS
#10 envelope is not one of the six named formats the API accepts, so the size has to come from the document. Declare it in the page box and set prefer_css_page_size in the request.
@page {
size: 9.5in 4.125in;
margin: 0.375in;
}
/* Where the address must land on the Letter sheet to appear in a
standard #10 window after a three-fold, measured from the top left. */
.letter .address-block {
position: absolute;
left: 0.875in;
top: 2in;
width: 4in;
height: 1in;
}The render request
With a custom size the options carry no format at all: the one flag tells the renderer to use the page box the document declares.
{
"html": "<!doctype html>...",
"options": {
// No named format. The page box in the document's own CSS is the
// size, and this flag is what tells the renderer to use it.
"prefer_css_page_size": true
}
}The mistake people make
Filling the window with the address block edge to edge. The sheet shifts inside the envelope by up to an eighth of an inch as it is handled, so an address that exactly fills the window will have a line clipped by the time it reaches a sorting machine. Leave an eighth of an inch of slack on every side.
Frequently asked
What is #10 envelope in pixels?
912 x 396 px at 96 dpi, at the 96 pixels to the inch that CSS assumes. That number is useful for comparing a screen mock-up against the page, and useless for laying out the document: use 241.3 x 104.8 mm instead, because a page laid out in pixels shifts whenever the render scale changes.
Can I pass #10 envelope as a format?
No. The API accepts six named formats: A4, A3, A5, Letter, Legal and Tabloid. #10 envelope is reached through the document's page box with prefer_css_page_size set, which is a supported path and not a workaround.
Does landscape need a different page size?
No. Landscape is the same rectangle turned, so it is set as an orientation rather than as swapped dimensions. Writing the width and height the other way round produces the same page and makes the intent harder to read later.
Other page sizes
Sizes that come up in the same conversation, and one from each of the other families.
DL envelope PDF size and window position
DL is 220 by 110 millimetres, the standard business envelope in Europe, and it takes an A4 sheet folded in three.
C5 envelope PDF size
C5 is 229 by 162 millimetres and it holds an A4 sheet folded once, or an A5 document flat.
A4 page size for PDF generation
A4 is the default page for business documents everywhere except North America, and the default this API uses when no format is given.
US Letter page size for PDF generation
Letter is 8.5 by 11 inches and it is the default page in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Chile and the Philippines.
4x6 shipping label PDF size
The 4 by 6 inch label is the standard thermal shipping label accepted by every major carrier, and the most common non-paper page size an API renders.
80mm thermal receipt PDF size
The 80mm roll is the standard point-of-sale receipt: 80 millimetres of paper, a printable width of about 72mm, and a length that depends on the order.
Business card PDF size and bleed
85.6 by 53.98 millimetres is the ID-1 rectangle: the size of a bank card, and the business card standard across most of the world.
Every page size, with dimensions
The full list, grouped by what the size is for.
Paste the CSS below into the playground and see the page box it produces.