Vistaprint Review

If you've watched local cable news programs in the past couple years, you've likely seen ads for printing service Vistaprint. Though you may be suspicious of as-seen-on-TV tech products, in testing, Vistaprint actually turns out to be one of the best online business card printing services around (though it prints far more than just business cards). Vistaprint offers reasonable pricing and decent design and paper options. It doesn't quite match GetPrint or PSPrint's bargain-basement prices or MOO's advanced options, such as NFC cards, but Vistaprint delivers the best overall combination of quality products and reasonable prices.

I tested Vistaprint mainly for its business card printing abilities. You can start designing your business card in Vistaprint without creating an account or providing any payment info. The minimum order has a list price of $15 for 100 cards, though the service runs frequent discounts. You can pay less for cards at GotPrint and PSPrint, which both offer initial orders as low as about $8. MOO, however, costs more, with entry-level pricing of $19.99 for just 50 standard size cards with square corners. EliteFlyers minimum business card order is $20. Staples charges that same price for 500 cards with same-day in-store pickup.

Vistaprint's premium cardstocks—linen and recycled matte—list at $24 for a pack of 100. Colored or textured paper will run you $32 per set of 100. Ultra-thick and Folded cards take you over $40 for a hundred; adding backside printing and rounded corners knocks the price up by $7 and $15, respectively. By comparison, MOO's top-end Luxe cards cost $69.98 for 100, PSPrint's Ultra cards cost $43.99, and GotPrint's Trifecta (triple thick) cards cost just $33.08 for the minimum 250 count.

Here's a quick glance at how much various business card printing services charge for 1,000 16pt cards:

One of the things you want on your business card is your website address, and Vistaprint offers a website-building service to help you get one set up, if you haven't done so already. As with the cards, the company lets you either self-design or use their professional design services for your site.

Besides cards, Vistaprint can print marketing materials such as brochures, postcards, coasters, mugs, magnets, signs, posters, clothing, and even tablecloths. It's an impressive selection, one that even extends to tech items like USB drives and mouse pads. GotPrint, MOO, and PSPrint also produce a range of non-card printed objects, but they're mostly limited to paper-based products.

Vistaprint's card-design interface is busier than competitor MOO's, but it gives you better control over the end result. You have three options when starting a business card order: Start Creating, Browse Designs, and Upload Your Design. When going the upload route, you can use images from your Instagram and Facebook accounts, as well as directly upload pictures from your PC or phone. I wish you could simply search the web for images or enter an image URL, however. I do like how your image shows up on the selection of prefab templates. The site also saves any images you upload, so you can switch back and forth if you decide that a previous one was better.

Vistaprint lets you create cards in three shapes: square, rounded corner, and standard. Other providers like GotPrint and MOO offer more size and shape options. I particularly like MOO's MOO Size, which is smaller so it fits in more wallets. And GotPrint has circles, ovals, and what it calls leaf shape. PSPrint goes a step further, letting you order custom die shapes for your cards.

In terms of paper stock, Vistaprint offers three main options along with 15 specialty options. The first comprise Standard 14pt, Premium 16pt, and Ultra-Thick 32pt, while specialty paper stocks include pearl, soft touch, linen, natural textured, recycled matte, Kraft (light-brown, 90% recycled), colored, uncoated, matte, and, glossy. New options are lastic, foil accent, and recycled matte (100% recycled). To those, you can add metallic or spot UV finishes.

Other special printing options include ColorFill (which has colored edges), ultra-thick, plastic, and folded cards. Of course, pricing shoots up when you choose such options, with folded cards starting at $43.75 for 500. MOO only offers four stock choices—Original, Cotton (100% recycled), Super, and Luxe—but it also adds a gold foil option, Letterpress (but only for preset designs, not for your text), as well as the unique NFC option, which opens your website on a smartphone when tapped.

If you start by browsing the templates, you can filter them by a variety of industries (Art & Entertainment, Beauty & Spa, Manufacturing, and so on), personal (Events, Baby, Moving, and so on), by style, or by the designs' photo placement. Again, it's helpful that Vistaprint shows these template samples with your very own info if you fill in a dialog box. One minor annoyance is that you can't edit some template features. For example, I found a template that I otherwise liked, but I couldn't edit out clipart of a camera aperture that I didn't want. This varies by template: With some I had no problem editing or replacing the design elements.

MOO's templates are more cutting-edge, and I wish that Vistaprint's color selection were more versatile—the red of my template didn't match that of the logo, so a dropper tool would have been welcome. When I added an image, though, a dialog informed me that its colors were detected and would be available for later editing. If you run into design problems like this, Vistaprint can have a professional designer adapt a template for you—that's reasonable!

Once you get to the point where you want to save your work for later perusal, you'll need to create an account—a simple matter of entering a name, email, and password.

You can add and remove text boxes to taste, and move them around so that everything fits. As you're moving text, guidelines helpfully let you align edges. This is something missing in MOO and GotPrint, and it's a big help when it comes to getting your design right. There's also a safety line that shows you the edge of the printable area. I also like how you can add or remove almost any elements. When you choose a template in MOO, you can't even remove the back-of-the-card image that comes with the template.

A very cool feature, buried under the More menu, is a QR code generator. Just enter your URL, email address, or phone number, and the site generates a code that, when scanned by a smartphone app like the Bing app, will open the page or offer to dial the number.

One less-than-helpful feature in Vistaprint is its proofing: This is a huge version of the card with the word PROOF watermarked across it. I'd rather see it closer to the actual size, without the watermark. The Preview option is better, and actually shows a smaller version of your completed card in a model's hand.

Once you're happy with your fonts and images, you move to the back of the card, which can be blank or include printing at extra cost. Adding color printing to the back adds $8, and monochrome adds $7. You then approve the design, choose the amount to print, add it to your cart, and enter payment info. A few upsells show up here, including thicker cardstock, wallets, and even a website builder option, but you can skip to the shopping cart.

A spiffy new 360-degree preview appears on this penultimate ordering page, along with (again) choices for rounded corners and fancy paper grades and effects like pearl, metallic, or spot UV—that raised ink effect. Amusingly, and I guess helpfully, the 360-degree VR preview updates to reflect any of these choices you may add. It's fun to play with, in any case.

My first test order of 100 standard cards with nothing on the back cost $15, with three shipping options: Express (3 business days) for $19.99, Standard (5 days, $6.99), and Economy (8 days, $4.99). That's a better deal than MOO, which charges $5.50 for Economy. Before I could complete the order I was presented with several card holders I could add to the order—yet another upsell attempt. I chose Standard shipping, and NY tax was $2.04, so my whole order came to $25.03. You do get a preview of the card even on this page, but there's no button or link to go back and edit it if you see one last thing you want to change. You can, however, use your browser history to go back and tidy up your design.

Just four business days after placing my order, I received the first test pack of cards, even though I'd chosen standard shipping method, which is estimated at five days. The second, higher-end order also arrived well within the shipping time window.

My Vistaprint orders did not fail to please: The printing was sharp and fully inked. The test image wasn't washed out as it was in the GotPrint low-end order comparison. Images and colored logos looked great, with deep rich colors.

In both the least and most expensive categories, Vistaprint's cardstock and print quality are at the top end of the range among services I tested. The premium glossy cards had a fine, lined texture and were somewhat off-white. The thinner, less-expensive matte cards felt substantial and high-quality nevertheless; the printing on those was just as fine.

Vistaprint impresses, with its excellent and flexible card-designing interface, reasonable pricing, and quality of the printed result. The service also offers a wide selection of cardstocks and will print your message on lots of other items, such as drinkware and clothing. Despite its less than up-to-the-minute template designs and its penchant for upsells, Vistaprint is a PCMag Editors' Choice for online business card printing services.

Vistaprint is the best online business card printing service we've tested, thanks to its combination of excellent print quality, good design tools, and reasonable prices. The company also prints promotional products like mugs, posters, and even tablecloths.

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