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Guided workflow variation

Trim, bleed and page size,read from the file itself.

Printers cut along the trim and expect artwork to run past it into the bleed. ProofSlip reads the boxes a PDF declares, measures the bleed on each side in millimeters, and says plainly when a file declares no trim box at all.

ProofSlip reports trim and bleed boxes, bleed per side and named page sizes, and warns below 3 mm, but it cannot see artwork in files that declare no boxes.

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One-time purchase on the Microsoft Store · No subscription · Instant install

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Buy through the Microsoft Store—instant install, automatic updates, and a Microsoft receipt for easy expensing. No account needed on our site, and no subscription on Store purchases.

Full ProofSlip overview
One-time purchase No telemetry Local-first

windows · one-page pass or fail · original never written · nothing uploads

If this sounds like your week

Thin white slivers at the edge come from missing bleed.

No guillotine cuts in exactly the same spot every time, so finished sheets are cut slightly inside where the artwork ends. When a background or photo stops precisely at the finished edge, a fraction of a millimeter of drift leaves a white line along the cut. Bleed prevents that: artwork extended a few millimeters beyond the trim, with page boxes recording where the trim sits and how far the extension reaches.

Where tooling usually breaks

Box settings are invisible until something reads them.

A page can declare media, crop, trim, bleed and art boxes, and most viewers display just one. Some readers draw boxes as an overlay, and command-line utilities print their coordinates in points, which you then convert and subtract side by side. Plenty of office and online-design exports set no trim box whatsoever and simply enlarge the sheet, which no box reader can confirm either way.

Where ProofSlip lands

Boxes listed, bleed measured per side, sizes named.

ProofSlip takes each page size from the trim box when present, otherwise the media box, and names common formats from A3 to A6, Letter, Legal, Tabloid, DL and business cards. When both trim and bleed boxes exist it measures all four sides and warns under 3 mm. A trim box lacking a bleed box, boxes extending outside the sheet, or mismatched page sizes also warn, and the Detail pane shows every box in points.

Pay once. Own it forever.

One-time purchase on the Microsoft Store · No subscription · Instant install

Get it from Microsoft

Buy through the Microsoft Store—instant install, automatic updates, and a Microsoft receipt for easy expensing. No account needed on our site, and no subscription on Store purchases.

Learn more about ProofSlip

windows · one-page pass or fail · original never written · nothing uploads

What you get

Feature highlights

One verdict, every finding graded

a single PASS or FAIL at the top, with each finding marked FAIL, WARN or INFO and the pages it affects, so the warnings are read as well as the verdict.

Fonts with the pages that use them

every font with its type, subset tag and embedding, and a FAIL when a font that paints visible text is not embedded, including the standard 14 base fonts.

Image ppi where it is placed

effective ppi for every placement, measured from the page itself and sorted lowest first, failing color and grayscale images below 150 ppi and 1-bit images below 300.

Trim, bleed and page size

size from the trim box or media box, named sizes such as A4 and Letter, and bleed on each side in millimeters, with a warning under 3 mm.

Color spaces page by page

Gray, RGB, CMYK, Lab and spot colors with their pages, every spot name and the output intent; RGB and Lab are warnings, and nothing is converted.

A report you can send, and an untouched original

a one-page PDF report or an HTML report saved as a new file, while the source PDF is opened read-only, never written, and nothing uploads.

Especially when

  • Check a client PDF for unembedded fonts, low-resolution images, RGB color and missing bleed on a Windows PC without uploading it
  • See the effective ppi of every placed image in a PDF instead of measuring each one by hand
  • Send a client a one-page report that names each problem and the pages it affects
  • Preflight print files without paying for professional prepress software or a PDF editor subscription

Who benefits

Real-world scenarios

An A4 flyer with 2 mm of bleed

A client exports an A4 flyer with the bleed set to 2 mm instead of the 3 mm the shop asks for. The trim box and the bleed box are both in the file.

ProofSlip shows the page as 210.0 × 297.0 mm, named A4, with 2.0 mm in the Bleed column and a warning: Bleed is 2.0 mm on page 1; ProofSlip expects 3.0 mm. The shop asks for a new export with 3 mm of bleed.

A newsletter printed from an office app

A newsletter arrives as a PDF printed from an office application. It declares no trim box and no bleed box, and its background color runs right to the page edge.

ProofSlip reports the media box size and an INFO note: No trim box; page size is the media box. It cannot tell whether the artwork extends far enough, so the shop compares the size with the order and asks for bleed where the edge needs it.

A booklet with one odd page

A 16-page booklet was assembled from two exports, and one insert page came through at Letter size while the other fifteen pages are A5.

The Pages table groups pages by size, and a warning reports that the pages are not all the same size, listing each group with its size in millimeters. The odd page is found before imposition rather than after printing.

Deep dive

Media, trim and bleed boxes, and how ProofSlip reads them

Five boxes, two that carry the job. Every PDF page has a media box, the full sheet the page describes. It may also have a crop box, which sets what a viewer displays; a trim box, the intended finished size after cutting; a bleed box, the area artwork may extend into so the cut lands inside it; and an art box. For print, the trim and bleed boxes carry the geometry of the job.

Page size. ProofSlip reports the size of the trim box when a page has one, and of the media box otherwise. The crop box is shown in the Detail pane but never used for the size. Sizes appear in millimeters, in the orientation a viewer shows, and a common size is named when it matches within one point: A3, A4, A5, A6, Letter, Legal, Tabloid, DL, US business card and Euro business card.

Measuring bleed. When a page has both boxes, the bleed on each side is the distance from the trim box out to the bleed box. The Detail pane lists all four values as left, bottom, right and top, and the Bleed column shows the smallest. Under 3 mm, rounded to a tenth, is a warning. A bleed of 0.125 inch is about 3.2 mm, so it clears that line.

What triggers each note. No trim box on any page is an INFO note rather than a warning, because many sound files never set one. A trim box with no bleed box is a warning, since the file states a finished size but no bleed. A trim or bleed box that reaches outside the media box is a warning. Pages that differ in size by more than a point are a warning, with the groups listed. Rotation and unusual page units are noted.

The limit of a box check. ProofSlip reads the boxes; it does not render the page. A file with a correct 3 mm bleed box can still have a background that stops at the trim, and a file without boxes can have bleed built into an oversized page. Neither case is visible to a box check, so look at the artwork edges in a viewer as well. ProofSlip does not add boxes, extend artwork or change the page size. Its report is a check, not a fix.

Matching the job. ProofSlip does not know the size that was ordered. Compare the size and named size in the Pages table with the job ticket, and the bleed with your printer's requirement, which can be more than 3 mm for some products. The 3 mm line is fixed in this version.

How it is built

Built to read the file and leave it alone.

Read-only by design

The PDF is opened read-only through the Windows file picker and never written. Reports are new files, and saving over the file being checked is refused.

Nothing leaves your PC

ProofSlip runs in a Windows app container with no network capability. There is no account and no telemetry. One-time purchase in the Microsoft Store.

A check, not a fix

It reports what the file contains and declares. It does not embed fonts, convert color, resample images or flatten, and it does not validate PDF/X.

FAQ

Straight answers—no glossary dump

How do I check the bleed in a PDF?

Bleed is the distance from the trim box out to the bleed box on each side of the page. In ProofSlip, choose Open PDF and read the Pages table: the Bleed column shows the smallest side, and selecting the row shows all four sides and every box in points. Bleed under 3 mm is a warning. If the file has no boxes, ProofSlip says so and cannot measure the bleed.

What is the difference between the trim box and the bleed box?

The trim box is the finished size of the page after cutting, such as an A4 flyer at 210 × 297 mm. The bleed box is larger and marks how far artwork extends past the trim so the cut lands inside the artwork. The media box is the whole sheet, and the crop box only controls what a viewer displays.

Why does ProofSlip say there is no trim box?

Because the file does not declare one, which is common for office exports, browser prints and many online design exports. ProofSlip then takes the page size from the media box and adds an INFO note. Without the boxes it cannot measure bleed, so compare the page size with the order and look at whether the artwork runs to the edge where it should.

Does a PASS mean the file will print as intended?

No. A PASS means ProofSlip found no failing finding: every font that draws text is embedded, no image is below the fail limits, and every page could be read. RGB color and thin or missing bleed are warnings, so read them too. ProofSlip does not render pages, so it cannot see artwork that stops short of the bleed, text too close to the trim, overprint, transparency or ink build-up, and it does not validate PDF/X conformance. Your printer's spec sheet has the final word.

Will ProofSlip change my PDF?

No. The PDF is opened read-only and is never written. ProofSlip is a check, not a fix: it does not embed fonts, convert color, resample images, add bleed or flatten anything. Each report is saved as a new file with a suggested name such as brochure-proofslip.pdf. If you pick the PDF being checked as the destination, ProofSlip refuses with a message that it is the file being checked, so the original cannot be overwritten by mistake.

Does anything leave my PC, and how do I get ProofSlip?

Nothing uploads. ProofSlip has no account and no telemetry, and it runs in a Windows app container that declares no network capability. It reads only the PDF you pick in the Windows Open dialog and writes only the report you save. It runs on Windows 10 version 2004 or later and on Windows 11, on x64 and ARM64 PCs. ProofSlip is a one-time purchase in the Microsoft Store, and the Store gives you a 15-day free trial of the full app, so you can check your own files before you buy.

Related pages

A preflight check for client PDFs, run on this PC. The resolution that matters is the one on the page. RGB, CMYK or spot? See what each page uses.

The PDF looks fine on screen.
Check it before the press does.

ProofSlip reads a client PDF on your PC and reports embedded fonts, page size, trim and bleed boxes, color spaces and effective image resolution, with one PASS or FAIL and a report you can send. It is a check, not a fix, and nothing uploads.

Pay once. Own it forever.

One-time purchase on the Microsoft Store · No subscription · Instant install

Get it from Microsoft

Buy through the Microsoft Store—instant install, automatic updates, and a Microsoft receipt for easy expensing. No account needed on our site, and no subscription on Store purchases.

Open full product page

Technical specifications

Technical specifications for procurement

Spec Implementation
Data Sovereignty Reads only the PDF you pick in the Windows Open dialog, read-only; writes only the report you save as a new file; the Recent list (up to 20 files) and window size stay in the app’s own settings on this PC
Telemetry Status None; no account, no analytics, and no crash upload (a local error log keeps error types only, never file names or contents)
Core Runtime .NET 10 and WinUI 3 (Windows App SDK), packaged as MSIX; runs in an AppContainer that declares no capabilities
Network Requirements Fully functional offline; no network capability is declared, and the app makes no network connections
Deployment Compatibility Windows 10 version 2004 or later and Windows 11, x64 and ARM64; one-time purchase on the Microsoft Store with a 15-day free trial
Checks Embedded fonts, page size and named size, trim and bleed boxes with bleed per side, color spaces with spot names and output intent, and effective image resolution per placement
Verdict FAIL for a used font that is not embedded, color or grayscale images under 150 ppi, 1-bit images under 300 ppi, or unreadable content; WARN and INFO for the rest; limits are fixed in this version
Reports One-page PDF report (Letter or A4, matched to the file) and a self-contained HTML report with the full lists, both saved as new files
Originals Opened read-only and never written; saving a report over the file being checked is refused
Input One PDF at a time; files that need a password to open are refused, and files with only an owner password open read-only
Not included No fixing, color conversion or flattening; no page preview, batch checking or PDF/X validation