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Print a 24 x 36 inch poster on Letter paper

24 x 36 inches is the standard movie poster size, and it is the size most people mean when they ask for a "big poster". A home printer cannot print it in one piece. You print it as tiles on Letter paper and join the sheets.

With a 0.25 inch printer margin and a 0.5 inch glue overlap, a 24 x 36 inch poster takes 16 Letter sheets in portrait (4 across, 4 down) or 15 sheets in landscape (3 across, 5 down). The tool below is already set to a 24 inch wide poster on portrait Letter. Add your image and it fills in the rest.

1. Your image

Loading a sample picture. You can also drop or paste an image.

Hatched area is blank paper. A shaded strip is overlap you glue. A1, A2 and so on are the page names.

Sheets
 
Poster size
 
Print quality
 

Print at 100% (Actual size). Do not choose Fit to page.

How to assemble

  1. Print one page and check it. Print at 100%.
  2. Trim the white edge along the solid marks. Keep the dashed edges.
  3. Line up pages A1 and A2, then B1 and B2. Glue each strip.
Paper orientation

3. Poster size

How the picture fills the poster

Fit shows the whole picture. The poster may have white at the edges.

Set the poster size by
Units

Most home printers cannot print within 0.25 in (6 mm) of the edge. The overlap is the strip you glue.

 

 

Sheets for a 24 x 36 inch poster

These counts use a 0.25 inch printer margin and a 0.5 inch overlap. The tool above shows the exact numbers for your picture.

Sheets for a 24 x 36 inch poster
Poster sizeLetter, portraitLetter, landscapeTabloid (11 x 17), portraitTabloid (11 x 17), landscape
24 x 36 in4 x 4 (16 sheets)3 x 5 (15 sheets)3 x 3 (9 sheets)2 x 4 (8 sheets)
36 x 24 in5 x 3 (15 sheets)4 x 4 (16 sheets)4 x 2 (8 sheets)3 x 3 (9 sheets)

Which layout should you pick?

Landscape saves one sheet on a 24 x 36 inch portrait poster, because 3 landscape sheets across cover the width with less waste than 4 portrait sheets. Check the thin strip warning in the tool. If the last row holds only a sliver of picture, the tool offers a slightly smaller poster that saves a whole row.

If you have a printer that takes Tabloid (11 x 17 inch) paper, the same poster needs only 9 sheets in portrait, which means fewer seams.

What image size do you need?

For a 24 inch wide poster, you need about 3600 pixels across to reach 150 dpi. A recent phone photo is usually 3000 to 4000 pixels wide, so it is close. If the tool shows a dpi below 100, expect soft edges up close. From across a room it still looks fine.

Hanging a 16 sheet poster

  • Lay the sheets on a clean floor in the grid order (A1, A2, A3, A4 in the top row).
  • Glue or tape from the back, one row at a time. Join the rows last.
  • Mount the finished poster on foam board or hang it with removable strips, so the seams do not sag.

Print at actual size

In the print dialog, choose 100% or Actual size. Do not choose Fit to page. That setting shrinks every tile, and the pieces will not line up. Print the test page first and measure it.

Questions

How many Letter pages make a 24 x 36 inch poster?

With a 0.25 inch margin and a 0.5 inch overlap, 16 sheets in portrait (4 x 4) or 15 sheets in landscape (3 x 5). A smaller overlap or margin can lower the count.

Is a 24 x 36 inch poster the same on A4 paper?

Almost. A4 is a little narrower than Letter and a little taller, but the count at this size is the same: 16 in portrait or 15 in landscape. See the A4 page for details.

Can I print it with no overlap?

Yes. Set the overlap to 0. The sheets then butt together. Joining is harder, and small printer errors show as gaps, so a thin overlap is easier for most people.

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