Getting a 24×36 Print From a PDF on Your Mac
Short answer: Your Mac can’t print 24×36 on its own. That takes a wide-format printer, and most home and office printers stop at letter or 11×17. What your Mac can do is make sure the PDF is a true 24×36 page. Once it is, any plan printer can print it at full size.
So the job is in two parts: find out what size your PDF is now, then fix it only if you need to.
Step 1: Find out what size the PDF really is
Preview’s Inspector won’t settle this. Apple says the Inspector shows details “such as file size, the author name, and the image resolution,” and it doesn’t promise page dimensions. The quickest check is our free PDF page size checker. Drop in the file and it lists every page’s size in inches.
There are three possible results:
- Every page is 24 x 36. You’re done. Skip to the end and upload it. Don’t run it through the steps below. Re-saving gains nothing.
- Pages are 12 x 18. That’s a half-size set, exactly half of 24×36 in each direction. Scaling it up is clean math (see the table).
- Pages are something else: 11×17, letter, 18×24. You can enlarge them, but read the scale section before you do.
Step 2: Make a 24×36 PDF in Preview
Unless your printer’s driver happens to offer 24×36, it won’t be in the Paper Size list, so you create it once. Apple’s custom size steps work from any app’s Print dialog:
- Open the PDF in Preview and choose File > Print.
- Click the Paper Size pop-up menu, then choose Manage Custom Sizes. Apple: “Click to add a new paper size, then specify the paper size you want.” Enter 24 by 36 inches and give it a name you’ll recognize.
- Set the margins to zero. Apple’s tip, written for clipped printouts, applies here too: “click the Margins pop-up menu, choose User Defined, then enter 0 (zero) for the nonprintable margins.”
- Back in the Print dialog, choose your new size from Paper Size.
- In the Preview section, Apple says: “To fill as much of the paper as possible, select Scale to Fit, then select Print Entire Image if you don’t want the image cropped.” Use Print Entire Image. Most plan sheets are landscape, so also select Auto Rotate, which Apple says rotates pages “so they fill up as much of the paper as possible.” Fill Entire Paper would crop the drawing “to the proportions of the paper,” and on a plan sheet that usually means losing part of the title block.
- Don’t click Print. Open the PDF pop-up menu at the bottom instead and choose Save as PDF. Apple: “Click the PDF button or click to open the PDF pop-up menu, then choose Save as PDF.”
Then run the new file through the page size checker again. It should read 24 x 36 on every page. Apple warns that these options “might not be available for your printer or app.” If the checker shows any other size, the custom size didn’t apply. Before you save again, make sure Paper Size shows your 24×36 entry.
What enlarging does to the drawing’s scale
Scale to Fit enlarges a page until one side touches the edge of the paper. The drawing grows by that same percentage, so any scale printed on the sheet grows with it. A sheet labeled 1/8 inch = 1 foot that’s enlarged 200% now measures at 1/4 inch = 1 foot. Its scale bar grows too, so the bar stays correct.
Here’s the math for common starting sizes on a portrait 24×36 page:
| Your PDF page | Enlarged by | Drawing ends up | Usable for measuring? |
|---|---|---|---|
| 12 x 18 | 200% | 24 x 36, edge to edge | Yes. Exactly doubled, so labeled scales double cleanly. |
| 18 x 24 | 133% | 24 x 32, white band at one end | Only with the scale bar. 133% isn’t a standard scale. |
| 11 x 17 | 212% | about 23.3 x 36 | Only with the scale bar. |
| 8.5 x 11 | 282% | 24 x about 31.1 | Rarely worth it. A scanned page gets soft when blown up this far. |
For permit or construction use, a written scale that no longer matches the paper causes trouble. Reviewers and builders measure with scale rulers. Unless your file is 12×18, the better fix is to ask whoever made the drawings for a 24×36 export. Enlarging is fine for a display or reference print. Just check our print-ready PDF plan set checklist before you order.
FAQ
Can’t I just print to my own printer with Scale to Fit?
You can, but Scale to Fit shrinks the 24×36 sheet to fit the paper in your printer. That’s fine for reading and wrong for measuring. Apple describes the same option under Paper Handling, “Scale to fit paper size,” with a Scale Down Only setting that keeps smaller documents at their original size.
Will Save as PDF keep my linework sharp?
Apple’s pages don’t say how Save as PDF handles vector drawings. After saving, zoom in hard on some small text in the new file. If it stays crisp, the linework came through. If it turns blocky, the page was flattened to an image. Use your original PDF and ask the designer for a 24×36 export.
My set has a few sheets at a different size. Does that matter?
Not for us. We print every page at its own size. If you want to change only some pages, Apple suggests saving “a PDF separately for each paper size,” then combining them in Preview.
I have Adobe Acrobat on my Mac. Is it any different?
Acrobat has its own Print dialog with different names, such as Actual size and Fit, so these Preview steps won’t match exactly.
Printing it
Once the checker shows 24 x 36, upload it for 24×36 printing. Sheets are $1.95 each in black and white or $3.75 in color. The price is the same from 18×24 to 36×48, and there’s no minimum, so a single sheet is fine. Order by 3 PM ET, ships same day, arrives as soon as the next day.
Mac, macOS and Preview are trademarks of Apple Inc. Print My Plans is not affiliated with Apple. Steps reflect Apple Support pages as checked on Oct 19, 2026.
