Business cards contain all types of colors, pictures, text, and textures. But one thing remains the same for all (well, most) business cards – the size.

The Standard Business Card Size is 3.5″ by 2.0″

Safe Area

When designing your business card, you want to keep all text in the “safe area.” This keeps the text from being on the very edge of the card, or worse, cut off! When business cards are printed, they are printed on sheets then trimmed to the standard size.

Sometimes, the cutting process is not always 100% accurate, and there can be a few millimeters of difference between the location of the text from card to card. Be sure to keep text out of the 1/4 inch area inside the card!

Bleed Area

The final size of your business card will be 3.5″ wide by 2.0″ high. (Reverse for vertical business cards).

With today’s fast, 4-color process printing, it’s very common to see colored backgrounds, flashy designs, and photographs used on business cards.

When using these backgrounds, you want to add 1/8 of an inch to each side of the business card. This is called the bleed area, and ensures that your cards have a full colored background when being cut.

If you designed your business card without a bleed area, and you had a colored background, there is a very good chance you will end up with a blank stripe (where nothing was printed because there was no bleed) running down or along your business card. Once again, this has to do with how business cards are cut from their final sheets.

Adding a bleed means your business card design will be 3.25″ wide by 2.25″ high during design. All you have to remember when designing with a bleed area is to make sure your background goes past the standard size into the bleed area.

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