Banner Sizes: 2x4, 3x6, 4x8, 6x10 Feet and Letter Height

How Big Should the Letters Be on a Banner?

Allow about one inch of capital letter height for every ten feet of viewing distance. That single rule picks the banner size, and everything else on this page is downstream of it.

Work it backward from where the reader stands. A banner set 80 feet off a road needs 8 inch letters, and a four word headline at 8 inches specifies a banner roughly 4 feet tall and 8 to 10 feet wide, whatever you had in mind before.

The second half of the rule is word count. At highway speed a reader has about two seconds, which is five to seven words total, including the phone number. The full set of rules for contrast, hierarchy and type is in our graphic guidelines for banner design.

Which Banner Size for Which Job?

Indoor and close range, 2 x 3 to 2 x 6. Trade show tables, registration desks, lobby walls. People are within 20 feet and often standing still, so you can afford more words.

Storefront and lawn, 3 x 5 to 3 x 8. The sizes that fit between two windows, across a railing, or on a church or school lawn. A 3 x 6 covers most storefront widths and stays light enough for one person to hang alone.

Street and parking lot, 4 x 6 to 4 x 12. Anything a driver reads. A 4 x 8 matches a sheet of plywood, which is why it fits so many fences and barriers, and it is the size people most often wish they had ordered after seeing a 3 x 6 go up on a busy road.

Building scale, 5 x 10 and up. Stage backdrops, dealership walls, festival entrances, highway frontage. At this size wind load is a real question rather than an afterthought, and the rigid version of the same curb message is covered in yard sign sizes.

How Do You Set Up a Banner File at Full Size?

Build at full size at 100 to 150 dpi, not at 300. A 4 x 8 banner at 300 dpi would be 14400 x 28800 pixels, a file no design program enjoys and no press needs, and at the distance a banner is read the extra resolution is invisible.

Two setups both work.

Full size at 100 to 150 dpi. A 4 x 8 banner becomes a 48 x 96 inch document, or 7200 x 14400 pixels at 150 dpi. Every measurement in the file is the real one, which makes the hem and grommet margins easy to hold.

Quarter scale at 300 to 600 dpi. Build the same banner as a 12 x 24 inch document and scale it up at output. Same effective resolution, a quarter of the file size, but remember to divide the safe margins by four as well.

Either way, keep logos and headline type in vector so they stay sharp at any scale. A logo pulled off a website at 200 pixels wide is a logo that will be four feet of mush.

When Should I Use Mesh Instead of Vinyl?

Use mesh whenever the banner is going on a fence or an exposed wall at 4 x 8 feet or larger. A solid vinyl banner in open wind acts like a sail, and the thing that gives way is usually the grommet, not the rope.

Our mesh banners are 9oz perforated mesh, which lets roughly 30 percent of the wind pass through while keeping the message readable. They run the same size list, from $64.19 for a 2 x 3 up to $264.00 for a 4 x 8 and $634.00 for an 8 x 10.

Two more choices change with the size rather than the design. Grommet count grows with the banner: hems and grommets are included on every banner we print, and past 6 feet wide you want to tie off every grommet rather than every other one, with bungee cords instead of zip ties so the banner can move without tearing. Double sided printing pays only where people pass both ways, across an entrance or perpendicular to traffic, and it is available on 18oz heavy duty vinyl. We ran that math in single vs double sided banners.

What Do Banner Sizes Cost?

On 13oz vinyl, single sided, with hems and grommets included: a 2 x 3 is $64.19, a 2 x 4 is $66.00, a 2 x 6 is $96.29, a 3 x 5 is $113.00, a 3 x 6 is $133.00, a 3 x 8 and a 4 x 6 are both $179.00, a 4 x 8 is $229.00, a 4 x 10 is $279.00, a 4 x 12 is $329.00, a 5 x 10 is $349.00, a 6 x 10 is $414.00 and an 8 x 10 is $549.00.

Heavier vinyl uses a shorter list. 15oz premium runs 3 x 5 at $128.39, 3 x 6 at $149.79, 4 x 6 at $192.59, 4 x 8 at $256.79 and 5 x 10 at $385.19. 18oz heavy duty, the only weight we print double sided, runs $139.09, $171.19, $224.69, $288.89 and $438.69 at those same five sizes.

Anything past 8 x 10, or any size not on the list, prices by the square foot or runs through custom orders. Banners are printed in the USA, every order includes a free digital proof, production is 48 hours once you approve it, and shipping is a flat $10 to any US address. The paper version of the same message, for indoors and close range, is covered in poster sizes.

Mistakes We Catch on Banner Proofs

Four things account for nearly every banner file we send back, and none of them are the mistakes a card or a poster makes.

Text sitting in the hem. This is the one we catch most. A phone number an inch from the bottom edge looks generous on a screen and is half folded over on the finished banner. The hem is not a margin we could skip, it is the reason the grommets hold, so the artwork has to move.

A headline sized for the page instead of the parking lot. A 4 x 8 laid out at 10 percent zoom looks balanced with a 3 inch headline. From the road that banner is blank. We measure the cap height on the proof and say something when it does not match the distance the banner is going to be read from, because that call is free before the ink goes down and expensive after.

A logo pulled off a website. At 200 pixels wide it is sharp in a browser and about 1.3 inches of usable print. Blown up to four feet it is a blur with a brand name attached. Send vector art, an AI, EPS or PDF, and this stops being a problem at any size.

Solid vinyl ordered for an exposed fence. Not a file problem, but the one that comes back as a torn banner in six weeks. If it is going on chain link at 4 x 8 or larger, order mesh.

What to Send Us

A print ready PDF at the bleed size, CMYK, built full size at 100 to 150 dpi, fonts outlined or embedded, and all text at least 2 inches inside the finished edge. That file goes straight to press.

Here is the short version as a checklist:

• Document built at the bleed size, 0.25 inch past the finished size on all four sides
• Full size at 100 to 150 dpi, or quarter scale at 300 to 600 dpi
• Text and logos 2 inches inside the finished edge, 3 inches top and bottom for pole pockets
• Logos and headline type in vector, never a web graphic scaled up
• Backgrounds and color blocks running all the way to the bleed edge

There is no setup fee. Upload any image or file and we make it print ready: size, bleed, resolution and color. If you have no design at all, Design it for me is +$32.10 on an item under $499 and free at $499 or more, which on the 13oz table above is the 8 x 10 at $549.00, and a designer builds the banner from scratch with two revisions included.

Our Banner Size Visual Guide

Four sizes, the same lines on each, with the bleed, the finished size, the hem, the grommets and the text safe area drawn to scale and every number in inches, feet and pixels at 150 dpi. Swipe through them and build to the one you need.