Mac OS X: Print Mailing Labels directly from Address Book

Contributor Icon Contributed by qmchenry Date Icon December 20, 2006  
Tag Icon Tagged: Apple Mac

Mac OS X comes with a simple but very usable address book application. Before taking a box for shipping, I thought to print out the destination address from my address book rather than scribbling it down. The options for printing information from Address Book are varied — mailing labels (including to Dymo label printers), envelopes, full page or small pocket lists. This tech-recipe describes printing mailing labels directly from Address Book.


From the Address Book screen, select the addresses you wish to print (command-clicking to select multiple addresses).

Click File -> Print… and you’ll see a print dialog window. The right side of this window contains configuration options as shown here:

The Style pulldown menu allows selecting Mailing Labels, Envelopes, and so on. Many sheets of labels are described by an Avery number on the box or carton which can be used in Address Book to indicate the layout of the mailing labels you have. If you know the Avery number, select Avery Standard in the Page option (as shown) and the Avery number in the pulldown to the right (the example above shows Avery number 5161).

The left side of the print window shows a preview of the labels:

If your labels do not have an Avery number, don’t despair (much). You can make a custom layout. While this seems deterministic, in my experience it will take a little trial and error to get the layout just right.

In the Page: pulldown, select Define Custom… which will open a small dialog box asking you to name the new layout. Enter an appropriate name and click OK. The margins set the unusable space between an edge of the sheet and the nearest label. In the Labels section, you define how many rows and columns of labels there are on a sheet. The Gutters section defines the unused space between labels, either horizontally (between columns) or vertically (up and down between labels).

If you are uncertain about the layout or other settings (and definitely if you have defined your own custom layout), try printing to a normal sheet of paper first and hold that page up against a bright light together with a real sheet of labels to check the alignment.

Once you have everything set the way you want, click Print.

Previous recipe | Next recipe |
 
  • kaplan
    I keep getting the kids names in my mailing labels. How do I just get:
    Mr. & Mrs. Steve Smith
    (address)
  • Nick C
    You can't you have a Mac (like me) and they look easy cos they don't let you do anything!
  • dogood
    Have you figured out a way to print labels in Address Book that include, Name, COMPANY, and address? I have spoken with Apple and they said there is freeware or something out there that will enable me to print labels that include the COMPANY name.
  • Alan Joslin
    How does one get the company names to print on mailing lables, below the person's name? I can only get the name and address to print, not the company. This is a real problem.

    Please help.
  • stacyq
    A workaround to add the Company name: Add the Company name to the 1st line of the address field, hit the return key, then enter the 1st line of the street address. Fill out the rest of the fields normally. HTH.
  • GuidoMac
    I couldn't get the formatting the way I needed it, and couldn't remember what I used on my old mac for labels(which wasn't much better). I saw a youtube vid on this topic, and went with an obvious suggestion...Avery.com...They have a simple FREE downloadable software that powerfully does everything I wanted and more, including logos, images(included), different fonts per label(but you need one text field per font/logo style[think of "move forward" "move to back" menu]). Total control!
  • C. Wheeler
    What if I want to print 30 labels of the same address... how do I get that one address to appear on each label?
  • Mimi
    Did you get an answer? I'm trying to do the same thing...
  • NormanMcN
    I did it by taking the one address and copying it 29 times (to use on a 30 label sheet) and then selecting those 30 entries. Of course, one then has to delete the 29 unwanted copies of the address, but that is no big deal to me.
  • iwinsoft
    I am use the iwinsoft label maker professional to make my label.
  • Chuck Taylor
    Like you show here in the demo if you printed this sheet how would you the rest of the labels? When you go to print the next time it always starts in the top left side. There is six labels left on your demo sheet.
blog comments powered by Disqus