Church bulletin size, folding and page order
The most common church bulletin is a single sheet of paper folded in half. It is cheap, it fits in a Bible, and it gives you four pages. Most of the trouble people have with it comes from page order. Here is how it works.
Paper size
In the United States and Canada, a letter sheet is 8.5 by 11 inches. Folded in half it gives you four pages that are 5.5 by 8.5 inches, which is often called half-letter. In most other countries the sheet is A4, which is 210 by 297 millimetres, and folded in half it gives four A5 pages.
The two shapes are close, but not the same. A4 is a little narrower and taller. If you move a layout from one to the other, check that nothing is cut off or leaves a thick empty band.
Four pages from one sheet
Hold a sheet of paper in landscape. Fold it in half so the fold is on the left. You now have a small booklet with a front cover, a back cover, and two inside pages. The four pages are:
- Page 1, the front cover.
- Pages 2 and 3, the two inside pages, side by side when you open it.
- Page 4, the back cover.
When the sheet is laid flat, one side holds pages 4 and 1 next to each other (the back cover on the left, the front cover on the right). The other side holds pages 2 and 3. That is why you cannot just print pages one after another and fold. The order on the paper is 4, 1 on one side and 2, 3 on the other.
Printing two-sided
Set the printer to two-sided, landscape, and flip on the short edge. Pick the wrong flip setting and the back will come out upside down. Print one copy first, fold it, and check the cover, the inside and the back before you run a full set.
If you print from a phone or from certain browsers, the page can come out blank or split. A PDF opened in a proper PDF viewer is more reliable than printing straight from a web page.
Margins and bleed
Most office printers cannot print right to the edge. Keep text at least half an inch (about 12 millimetres) inside every edge. A design that runs a picture or colour to the edge of the page, called full bleed, needs a printer that can handle it or a print shop that trims the sheet afterwards. If you print at the church, a white border around the cover is usually better than a cut off picture.
When to use more than one sheet
Two sheets folded together make eight pages, and the page order is harder: it is easy to get wrong without software. Unless you regularly run out of room, one sheet is better. Cutting words usually helps more than adding pages.
Paper
A matte paper in a weight a little heavier than office paper holds a fold well and feels better in the hand. Glossy paper looks good but shows glare under the platform lights, which makes it hard for some people to read.
Bulletin Generator prints a four-page bifold in the correct order for either letter or A4, so you only pick the paper size once.
Common questions
What size is a folded church bulletin?
A letter sheet (8.5 by 11 inches) folded in half makes four pages of 5.5 by 8.5 inches. An A4 sheet folded in half makes four A5 pages.
Should I print one-sided or two-sided?
Two-sided. A bifold bulletin has pages on both sides of the sheet, and two-sided printing keeps the page order right.