How Large is a B1 Sheet of Paper?

What size is B1 paper? And exactly how big is A2 paper?

Actually, for that matter what size is A1, B2 and any other shape or size sheet of paper.

Litho Printing

Paper sizes can be confusing because there are no sure round numbers involved.

How big is B1 size paper

So whereas some people will know that an A4 sheet of paper is 210mm x 297mm and that when you move onto the A3 paper size (which is twice as big) you just double the shorter measurement giving 210mm x 2 = 420mm, but that you leave the 297mm untouched.

Confused?

Well there's a added twist to know about. Most people will have heard of the 'A' paper sizes, but then there are 'B' and 'C' sizes too.

B sizes are for real uncomplicated because they're just a big bigger than A size paper. So for example if you want to know what B4 looks like, then you should visualise a sheet of paper which is just a bit bigger than an A4 sheet or 353mm x 450mm to be precise.

But why would anyone ever want a B4 sheet of paper. After all it sounds pretty non-standard - and it is.

The rejoinder is that B paper sizes are mostly used by the printing industry because these 'oversized' sheets of paper allow for a printed page to go up to and beyond the edge of a sheet of paper, which allows for so called bleed.

Now in reality this is for real of interest once you start printing on B2 (707mm x 500mm) and B1 (1000mm x 707mm) respectively.

Now a B1 sheet of paper gives you 8 pieces of A4 on one side of the sheet or 16 pieces of A4 out if you include printing on both sides.

That's the underground to how large litho printing fellowships can yield so much printing, so quickly. Lots of pages are printed in one pass straight through the printing press. Later on they are cut and trim and sometimes stitched (that's just a fancy term for stapled) into booklets, catalogues and brochures.

And that in a nutshell is why the B range of paper sizes exists.

Unless you're concerned in envelopes then you can ignore C sizes for now. Here's a useful paper size guide which will show you A, B and C paper sizes in millimetres.

How Large is a B1 Sheet of Paper?

Litho Printing