How to print one A4 page as two A5 pages in Microsoft Word
It’s a common problem: you have written your article, poster, flyer or handout on an A4 page in MS Word, and you suddenly think to yourself, “I could do with printing two of these per page at A5 size”.
Figure 1: Initial A4 Page
Now, Word has what looks like the perfect option; the ‘Pages per Sheet’ dropdown in the Print dialog box.
Figure 2: Print dialog with 2 pages selected
Trouble is, if you pick this option, what you get is this:
Figure 3: A5 page, but only one on A4
No problem, you think, I’ll just choose 2 copies in the print dialog. Unfortunately, what this gives you is two copies of Figure 3; you don’t get the two A5 copies side by side on one sheet, but instead you get two bits of A4 paper, with the same wasted space on the right.
At this point you probably bite the bullet and copy your A4 page onto another page, so your source document is now two pages long, page two being a duplicate of page one. This is less than ideal because any subsequent changes will have to be made to both pages, increasing the risk of errors creeping in, and also wasting valuable time.
Figure 4: Two separate A4 pages
There is a better way! My method uses just one A4 page, so any changes need only be made once. All you need to do, in the Print dialog box, is change the ‘Page Range’ from All to Pages: 1,1. Remember to keep ‘Pages per Sheet’ set to 2.
Figure 5: Print dialog with custom page range selected
VOILA! Your A4 page is now perfectly printed as 2 A5 pages, side by side on a single A4 sheet.
Figure 6: Two A5 copies on a single A4 sheet
48 Comments to How to print one A4 page as two A5 pages in Microsoft Word
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I just know that there will come a day when I hit this problem and will be glad that I have ‘bookmarked’ Iain’s very clearly documented solution.
As ever well thought out and useful material.
Thank you. I’ve been searching for this solution for a while. New problem, though, is I have a 200+ page document that I need to print this way. I can only type in around 46 pages. Any thoughts?
Do you mean that you want to duplicate each page twice on an A4 sheet, and have been typing in ‘1,1,2,2,3,3′ and so on? The only reason I wanted to do this was to avoid wasting paper when printing a single A4 page twice as A5; we then guillotined them to make two A5 flyers.
If you have more than one page you can simply ignore the ‘1,1′ bit and just set the ‘Pages per sheet’ to 2. This will then print the first and second pages on one A4 sheet, the third and fourth pages on the second A4 sheet, and so on. If you choose multiple copies of the document it will start again after the final page.
Have I understood you correctly? The only way I can see this being a problem is if you really must print two copies of the first page on the first A4 sheet, and two copies of the second page on the second A4 sheet. I just can’t see why you’d want to do that; if like me, you’re guillotining them it doesn’t matter what order they come in, you just don’t want any wasted paper.
Thank you so much for such a useful description!! Was getting increasingly frustrated that I couldn’t remember how to do this and every option I tried wasn’t quite right so I thought I’d google it just in case and voila!
It’s a pleasure; glad it’s useful to more people than just me
I know what you mean; having spent ages banging my head against the wall, once I finally worked it out I thought “I must write this down”, hence the blog post.
So what do you do if you want to print 4up on an A4 sheet?
All you do is pick ‘4 pages per sheet’ and type ‘1,1,1,1′ in the Page Range box.
Thanks so much! Any ideas on how to do it landscape though?
This was a wonderful clearly documented guide. I’m really thankful to you.
Thank you so much
Thanks very much for your explanation – it’s been tough trying to find an easy solution to a common problem. Another Word failure!
thanks so much. had tried and exhausted many avenues. was pulling my hair out….so THANKS!!
Just woooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww !!!
thx a lot for simplified explaination …
Oh my goodness, thats brilliant and soooo easy!! I’ve been trying to do it for so long and have asked so many people. Your explanation and use of copying the page made it so much better. Thank you, thank you.
This is very useful lateral thinking! Saved me hours of experimentation…
If you want to print landscape A5 pages top to bottom on portrait A4, the solution is slightly different:
1. go to File | Page Setup
2. on the ‘Margins’ tab, set the following:
> Orientation: Portrait
> Multiple Pages: 2 pages per sheet
> [if you have more than one section] Apply to: Whole document
3. on the ‘Paper’ tab, set Paper size to A4
4. Click OK.
5. Print with 1,1,2,2,3,3,4,4… in the pages box in the print dialog (as described in the article). You do not need to / cannot set the ‘Pages per sheet’. Just leave it at 1.
Alternatively, if all this is too much for you, never underestimate the power of brute force: print one page to a sheet, then turn the paper round 180 degrees and run it back through the printer!
A handy addition, should you find yourself with an A5 document that needs similar treatment (as opposed to an A4 original). Thanks for contributing!
Thank you so much for this. I have been trying to do it all afternoon.
Vikki
thank you! but how do you print out 2 different a4 pages?
If you have two different A4 pages in the same document, then you don’t have to worry about putting 1,1 in the ‘Pages’ box. You can just leave it as Print All (but remember to still pick 2 Pages in the ‘Pages per sheet’ dropdown list).
Very usefull! Thanks a lot!
This is so helpful, thanks. Is it possible to go one step further – I want to print 4 up, ie A6, but I want to print across the long side not the short side. The idea is I print in two columns, and can then fold in the middle to make an A6 folded card . . . rotating doesn’t do it, and I’m stuck – any ideas would be gratefully appreciated! Chris
I am still confused… I wish to print a book I have written in A5 on an A4 sheet. It would be more efficient if I could print Page one in A5 twice on A4 for a total of 144 sheets then cut in ‘half’ producing two books. My printer a HP 2055d can do duplex at 1.8 seconds per page. However, if I print in A5, I must manually feed for duplex, which takes 9.2 (per side) seconds/sheet.Most unsatisfactory
What if I have two different A4 pages, but want to print them both as A5 on an A4 sheet?
Then all you need to do is open up the Print dialog as usual (Ctrl-P) and pick ‘2 pages’ in the ‘Pages per sheet’ dropdown. The settings in Figure 2, above, would work perfectly for you.
Is there a way I can print an A5 booklet where the original, lets say for sake of simplicity runs to 8 A4 pages. I have a duplex printer.
So the first sheet would have page 1 & 8 on one side, 2 & 7 on the other,
the second sheet would have 3 & 6 with 4 & 5 on the other side.
This is fantastic. I have searched long and hard and wondered how this could be done. These instructions are very well documented and beats some of the more complex instructions of help, found within the product.
Hi, i did the 2 on a page thing. but its printing all wonky now and small. See, my A4 poster was out of the margins…..now i click 2 to a page and they are small, wonky and not in the same sorta margin (but for a 2 page)…if u gett me? I just want the a4 poster thing…. with the same margins…. but as 2 to a page. Its really frustrating me…Help??
Hi Can someone help me,I am trying to do the same(print 2 a5 sheets on 1 a4,but my printer dialog box is different from the one shown.I am trying to print from microsoft word and my dialog box says pages 1 to 1 and it wont let me put in 1,1.Please help
Awesome thanks so much!
I join with all the thanks and encouragement above. Not only did you solve my immediate problem, which has been tormenting me for months, you’ve given the key to solve many similar layout difficulties. Many many thanks!
Thank thank you so much for the information,i can’t tell you how much paper i have wasted cutting down to a5. My son my daughter and myself thank you, thank you, thank you.
This site is now top of my favorites! I have been asked to design a poster on behalf of my Wife for our local Pre-school, which I have done without a problem. I enjoy having a “play” with my new Microsoft Word package and my printer, as it gives me more experience towards hopefully a new career in I.T or similar environment (I’m currently working towards my ECDL). The school has requested a normal A4 poster, and also an A5 plus 4 copies on one A4 sheet. Well thanks to my new knowledge in word processing etc, I thought this would not be a problem. How wrong I was… After trying for several hours and wasting paper and ink attempting to print their other requests, I eventually Googled the problem and stumbled upon this great site. Thank you, thank you thank you. Excellent solutions to what seems at first to be a simple task…….Once again thank you.
wow, have been struggling with this for a while, thanks loads!!!
That’s brilliant! Thanks Iain.
THANK YOU
it didnt work the first time, but it did the second! Flaming hours of wasted time, ta ta ta ta ta
xxxxx
Thank you very much! Fab Guide!
thanks so much for this tip, I’ve been pulling my hair out for over an hour before Googling.
Thanks for this tip. Saved me a lot of time.
Wow! Thanks soooooo much! You have saved me ages! I was doing my psychology project in A5 format, but then I realised that I have no idea how to print 2 pages on 1 A4 and that I will probably have to cut them out and waste sooo much paper…
:):)
Soooo THANK YOU!
Now why can’t you find this in the manual.
God bless Google, the internet and you.
Thank you.
THANK YOU!! Luckily I googled it before wasting my time getting frustrated and I’m very glad I did!! SO simple when you know how!! Again, thank you!
After many wasted pages and following the exact path as laid out which made me LOL when reading I too had success so Thank you, Thank you, Thank you, can you not write the manuals for inserting formulas in excel?
Iain, I wanted to print 4up on an A4 sheet and having spent considerable time without success, I was delighted to find your blog on how to do this – pick ‘4 pages per sheet’ and type ‘1,1,1,1′ in the Page Range box.
Thank you so much for your post on this.
Many Thanks. You are a genius!!
Should’ve done this ages ago. Before I got banned from the School Libary for 6 months for printing too many pages.. and ended up throwing them in the bin anyway..
I’ve got a question.. Do you do the (1,1) thing if you want the two a5 pages on the a4 sheet if you want them to be different..?
Or do you do (1,2)? Sorry, confused.
If you have two different A4 pages that you’d like to print on a single piece of A4 paper, then you can just choose ‘Print Range: All’ in the Print window. This is exactly the same as doing (1,2).
This worked !!!
Now how do I do the same thing with publisher, the print box does not give you the same options.
I’m not an expert on Publisher (nor Word, really) but my printer allows me the option of printing ‘2 Pages per sheet’ when I click on the ‘Properties’ button in the Print dialog box. This might work for you, but it’s a printer-specific workaround, so no guarantees…
This worked, however only when the scaling of paper size was changed from ‘No Scaling’ to ‘A4′.