Choose Tabloid (or Ledger for landscape) as the paper size, then pick Fit. A Letter page enlarges to 129.4%, and an 11 × 17 page shrinks to 64.7% on Letter. Here's where the setting lives in each app, what the scaling does to your text, and why some printers never offer the size.
Tabloid and 11 × 17 are the same sheet. Ledger is that sheet turned sideways, which is why print dialogs list "Tabloid" for portrait and "Ledger" for landscape. A3 is the international cousin and it's close, but not the same: 17.6 mm narrower and 11.8 mm shorter, so a Tabloid file printed on A3 gets scaled to 97.3% unless you crop it.
| Name | Inches | Millimetres | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Letter | 8.5 × 11 in | 215.9 × 279.4 mm | US office paper |
| Legal | 8.5 × 14 in | 215.9 × 355.6 mm | Same width as Letter, 3 in longer |
| Tabloid | 11 × 17 in | 279.4 × 431.8 mm | Exactly two Letter sheets side by side |
| Ledger | 17 × 11 in | 431.8 × 279.4 mm | Tabloid turned landscape; same paper |
| A3 | 11.69 × 16.54 in | 297 × 420 mm | Wider and 11.8 mm shorter than Tabloid |
| A4 | 8.27 × 11.69 in | 210 × 297 mm | Half of A3 |
Every app has two separate controls, and the mistake people make is setting one and not the other. One is the paper size, which tells the printer what's in the tray. The other is the scale, which decides how big the page is drawn on that paper. Here's where both live:
| App | Paper size setting | Scale options |
|---|---|---|
| Adobe Acrobat or Acrobat Reader | Print → Page Setup (Windows) or the Paper Size menu (Mac); tick "Choose paper source by PDF page size" to let the file pick | Fit, Actual size, Custom scale |
| Chrome and Edge | Print → More settings → Paper size → Tabloid | Scale: Default, Fit to printable area, Custom |
| Firefox | Print → More settings → Paper size | Scale: Fit to page width or a percentage |
| Mac Preview | Print → Paper Size (expand the dialog with Show Details) | "Scale to Fit" tickbox |
| Windows printer driver | Printer Properties → Paper or Layout tab | Varies; often "Fit to page" |
| Linux command line | lp -o media=Tabloid -o fit-to-page file.pdf | fit-to-page scales, otherwise prints at 100% |
If Tabloid isn't in the paper size menu, the printer driver doesn't offer it, and no setting in the PDF app will add it. Most home inkjets stop at Legal. Office copiers, A3 inkjets and any print shop will have it.
Pick Tabloid as the paper and choose Fit (or "Fit to printable area"). The page scales to 129.4%, limited by width: 8.5 in becomes 11 in exactly, while 11 in becomes 14.24 in, leaving 2.76 in of blank paper split between the top and bottom. Twelve-point body text comes out at 15.5 pt. Nothing is cut off, but the proportions of Letter and Tabloid differ, so the fit is never edge to edge.
The other way to use the sheet is to put two Letter pages side by side at 100%. Tabloid is exactly two Letter sheets, so set the paper to Ledger (landscape) and choose 2 pages per sheet, as we show in our guide to printing multiple pages on one sheet. We checked both layouts by building the pages in PyMuPDF: a Letter page placed in half of a 17 × 11 sheet lands at precisely 100%.
Fit does it, at 64.7%. The height is the limit this time: 17 in shrinks to 11 in and 11 in shrinks to 7.12 in, leaving 1.38 in of blank margin across the two sides. Twelve-point text drops to 7.8 pt, which is legible for a poster headline and painful for a spreadsheet.
If the result is too small, you have three options. Print on Legal paper instead, which only gets you to 77.3%. Tile it across four Letter sheets at full size, which our poster printing guide walks through. Or trim the file down to the part you need with the PDF cropper and print that at a larger scale.
| From | To | Fit scale | 12 pt text becomes | Printed image |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Letter | 11 × 17 | 129.4% | 15.5 pt | 11.00 × 14.24 in |
| 11 × 17 | Letter | 64.7% | 7.8 pt | 7.12 × 11.00 in |
| 11 × 17 | Legal | 77.3% | 9.3 pt | 8.50 × 13.14 in |
| 11 × 17 | A3 | 97.3% | 11.7 pt | 10.70 × 16.54 in |
| A3 | 11 × 17 | 94.1% | 11.3 pt | 11.00 × 15.56 in |
| A4 | 11 × 17 | 133.0% | 16.0 pt | 11.00 × 15.56 in |
Office multifunction printers from the big copier brands nearly all take it. Among desktop machines, look for "wide format" or "A3" inkjets; many of them list 11 × 17 as a supported size, but check the spec sheet, because Tabloid is 12 mm longer than A3 and some A3 trays stop there. Copy shops and office-supply stores print Tabloid as a standard size, and they'll want a single PDF, so combine your pages with the PDF merger first and set the page size you expect in the file name so nobody scales it by mistake.
Tabloid when it's portrait and Ledger when it's landscape. Both names refer to the same 11 by 17 inch sheet (279.4 by 431.8 mm). It's exactly twice the size of Letter paper. A3 is similar but a different size: 297 by 420 mm.
Only if the printer supports it, and most home inkjets and laser printers stop at Legal (8.5 by 14 in). If Tabloid isn't in the paper size list of your print dialog, the printer can't take it. Office copiers and A3 inkjets can.
Set the paper size to Tabloid and choose Fit or Fit to printable area. The page enlarges to 129.4%, with 8.5 in becoming 11 in. Because the two sizes have different proportions, about 2.76 in of blank paper is left top and bottom.
Set the paper size to Letter and choose Fit. The page prints at 64.7%, so 12-point text becomes about 7.8 points. For a bigger result, tile it across four Letter sheets using the poster option in Acrobat Reader.
No. A3 is 297 by 420 mm, while 11 by 17 is 279.4 by 431.8 mm. A3 is wider and shorter. A Tabloid PDF printed on A3 scales to 97.3%, and an A3 PDF printed on Tabloid scales to 94.1%.