Wide ruled paper
Print at 100%. In the print dialog choose Actual size (or Scale: 100), not Fit to page. Then hold a ruler to the line at the bottom of the sheet.
How to print at actual size, dialog by dialog
- Chrome and Edge: open More settings, find Scale, and pick Actual size if it is listed. If it is not, pick Custom and type 100. Avoid Fit to printable area and Fit to paper.
- Firefox: untick Fit to page width, then set Scale to 100.
- Safari and Preview on a Mac: set Scale to 100%, not Scale to Fit.
- Adobe Acrobat and Reader: under Page Sizing, choose Actual size. The file already asks for it.
- iPhone and iPad: the print sheet has no scale setting. Print, then measure the line.
- Android: this depends on the printer app. Turn off any Fit to page option, then measure the line.
- Any browser: pick the file that matches the paper in your printer. A US Letter file on A4 paper, or the reverse, gets shrunk to fit.
This page starts from wide ruled paper: lines 11/32 inch apart, about 8.7 mm, with a red margin line 1 1/4 inches from the left edge. That is the ruling of wide ruled notebooks and loose-leaf filler, the one with the most room for each line of handwriting. On a US Letter page with half inch margins it gives 28 lines.
On A4 the page starts from 8 mm lines, the nearest metric ruling, with the margin line 32 mm from the edge: 33 lines at a 12 mm margin. Every setting stays open above, so the same page also prints college ruled, narrow ruled or a spacing of your own.
Wide ruled lined paper, measured
The wide ruled lined paper here is drawn to the number, not traced from a scan of a notebook. Each line sits exactly 11/32 inch below the one before, placed by its own distance from the first line so that rounding never adds up down the page. The block of lines is centered top to bottom inside the margins, and the strip below it holds the calibration line.
The margin line is drawn in red at 1 1/4 inches from the left edge of the page, the position used on wide ruled notebook paper. If you set a page margin wider than that, the margin line would fall inside the margin, so the generator leaves it off and tells you why. Clear the Margin line box to print lines only.
Lines print in gray by default, light enough to write over but still clear on a cheap printer. Choose Black for a sheet that will be copied, or Non-photo blue for lines that many scanners and black and white copiers drop.
Print it at 100%, not fit to page
Print dialogs shrink pages a little so nothing is cut off. For wide ruled paper that quietly changes the ruling: shrunk to fit, 11/32 inch lines come out closer to 1/3 inch, and the sheet no longer lines up with the paper you are matching.
So when you print, choose Actual size, or set Scale to 100. The file asks viewers not to scale it, and Adobe Acrobat and Reader follow that request. Chrome's built-in PDF viewer, which opens most downloads, does not, so in Chrome or Edge open More settings and set Scale to Actual size, or to Custom and 100 if Actual size is not listed. The steps for other browsers and phones are in the list under the download buttons.
Print the Letter file on Letter paper and the A4 file on A4. A file printed on the other size gets shrunk to fit even at 100%.
Check your print with the calibration line
The line at the bottom of every sheet is exactly 4 inches long on inch sheets and exactly 10 cm long on metric sheets. Lay a ruler along it with zero at the left end; the small ticks mark every half inch or every centimeter.
| The 4 in line measures | The 10 cm line measures | What happened |
|---|---|---|
| 4 in, within about 1/32 in | 100 mm, within about 0.5 mm | Printed at actual size. |
| about 3 7/8 in (3.89 in) | about 97.3 mm | A US Letter file was shrunk to fit A4 paper. |
| about 3 3/4 in (3.76 in) | about 94.1 mm | An A4 file was shrunk to fit US Letter paper. |
| about 3.8 to 3.9 in | about 95 to 97 mm | Fit to printable area or Fit to page was on. |
| about 4 1/16 to 4 1/8 in | about 102 to 103 mm | Borderless printing enlarged the page. |
A short line means every line space is short by the same ratio. At 3.89 inches the 11/32 inch lines came out about 0.334 inch apart; across 27 spaces the last line lands about a quarter inch higher than it should.
Wide ruled or another ruling
- College ruled paper: 9/32 inch lines, for smaller handwriting.
- Lined paper in any ruling: narrow ruled at 1/4 inch, and any spacing you type in.
- Handwriting paper: rows with a dashed midline, for practicing the height and shape of letters.
Wide ruled suits large or fast handwriting, notes you will annotate later, and anyone who finds college ruled cramped. Printable wide ruled paper is also a good fit for a binder: punch it, and it sits with store-bought filler because the ruling and the margin line match.
PDF or PNG
The PDF is the file to print: it is vector, it carries the page size, and it asks the viewer not to scale. The PNG is drawn at 300 pixels per inch for note apps that want an image as a page background. Image viewers often fit pictures to the paper, so print from the PDF. The ready-made wide ruled PDFs for Letter and A4 are under the download buttons.
What this page does not do
It does not upload anything, and there is no account. It cannot see your printer or change its settings, which is why the calibration line is there. The preview is a picture of the sheet, not the sheet at actual size, so do not hold a ruler to the screen.
Frequently asked questions
How far apart are the lines on wide ruled paper?
11/32 inch, about 8.7 mm. College ruled lines are 9/32 inch apart and narrow ruled lines 1/4 inch. On a US Letter page with half inch margins, wide ruled gives 28 lines.
Is wide ruled the same as legal ruled?
Yes. Legal ruled is another name for the same 11/32 inch spacing, with the margin line about 1 1/4 inches from the left edge, where it sits here.
What is the A4 version of wide ruled paper?
There is no exact one. 11/32 inch is 8.73 mm, and A4 exercise books are usually ruled at 8 mm or 7 mm, so this page uses 8 mm on A4. Type 8.73 into Line spacing for the exact US ruling on A4 paper.
Why do my printed lines not match my notebook?
The print dialog scaled the page. Measure the calibration line: if it is short, set Scale to 100 or Actual size and print again. A Letter file printed on A4 paper is shrunk as well, so use the A4 file there.
Is this wide ruled paper free to print?
Yes, and there is no account. The sheet is drawn by code running in your browser, and the only thing sent anywhere is an anonymous count of page views and downloads, described on the privacy page.