Your First Preflight
Check a PDF file for the first time: upload it, read the result, download or share the report. Your file does not leave your device.
Your First Preflight
Preflight measures your PDF before it goes to print: page geometry, bleed, image resolution, colour space, fonts and active content. This page gets you through your first check in a few minutes.
What to have at hand
A real PDF you are about to send to print. A real job shows you far better what the tool tells you
than a sample file does. The file must have a .pdf extension and be at most 200 MB.
Step by step
Open the preflight tool
Open the preflight page. You do not need an account.
Screen against what?
Use the Screen against selector to choose which profile the check is made against: Print baseline (total ink limit 330 %, for coated paper), Print baseline — uncoated (280 %), PDF/X-1a or PDF/X-4 screening, or accessibility declarations. The paper type is not guessed from the file; if you will print on uncoated paper, you choose the uncoated profile yourself.
Drop in the PDF
Drag the file onto the box, or choose it with Choose a file. The file is not sent to a server; it opens in your browser and stays there.
Wait for the check to finish
The tool evaluates each rule one by one. When it finishes you see how many rules were evaluated and how many could not be.
Read the result line
The top result is one of five: Ready, Ready (checked in the browser), No issues found in the pre-check, Review or Could not be evaluated. You can find what they mean in the guide to reading results.
Look at the findings
Each finding tells you which page it is on and why it matters; findings are split into errors, warnings and information.
Save the report
Use Download report to save the report to your computer. If you are a member, Copy share link (in a batch check, Share report) creates a link and lets you pick how long it lasts (1, 7, 14 or 30 days). Only signed-in members of your organization can open the link.
What if the result is not good?
- If the findings are things to fix in the design file (such as low resolution or missing bleed), fix the file in the program it was made in, export it again and re-check. Remember that the tool does not silently change these for you.
- If a finding can be solved at page level (page order, rotation, cropping), open the file in Studio.
- If you are unsure, send the report to your print shop; it also states which things could not be measured.
If the file does not open
If the file is too large, damaged or asks for a password, the tool says so with a clear message and does not count the file as passed. A file with a damaged structure may be read only for inspection, repaired in memory; such a file is never Ready, and the file itself is not changed.
A diagnostic report is not a print approval
The report is a record of what the tool measured. Your print shop's own preflight has the final say.
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