How to Print Aadhaar Card on A4 at Real Size

What you need

• Your e-Aadhaar PDF downloaded from the UIDAI website, or clear photos of the front and back of your card.
• The PDF password: the first 4 letters of your name as printed on the Aadhaar, in capitals, followed by your year of birth. For Suresh Kumar born in 1990 it is SURE1990.
• A printer with A4 paper. Thicker paper gives a sturdier card.

Print only your own Aadhaar, or one you are allowed to handle, such as a family member's with their consent. When the full number is not needed, a masked Aadhaar is safer, because it shows only the last 4 digits. You can choose it when you download the e-Aadhaar, and print it here the same way.

How to crop and print the Aadhaar card, step by step

1. Open the Aadhaar Card Print tool and choose your e-Aadhaar PDF, or the photos of the card.
2. Type the password when asked and press Open PDF. If you typed the letters in small case, the tool also tries them in capitals.
3. Check the two frames. The tool looks for the dashed “cut here” line on the page and starts each frame on the front and back panels. If it cannot find them, the frames start where the panels usually sit.
4. Adjust each side if needed: drag to move, use the zoom slider, Turn 90°, or Straighten up to 15° either way. If front and back are the wrong way round, press Swap front and back.
5. Choose the layout, Cut apart or Fold in the middle, and how many copies you want on the page, from 1 to 4.
6. Press Print to open the A4 PDF in a new tab, or Download PDF to save it. Download JPG gives the same A4 page as a picture at 300 DPI.

Only the first page of a PDF is used, which is where the card is on an e-Aadhaar. The PDF, the password and your photos stay in your browser. Nothing is uploaded, which matters for a document with your number, photo and address on it.

Print settings: use Actual size (100%)

This is the step that most often goes wrong. Each side is placed at exactly 85.6 x 54 mm on the page. If the print dialog scales the page, the card comes out the wrong size.

After printing, measure the front with a ruler. It should be 85.6 mm wide and 54 mm tall. If it is smaller, the page was scaled: print again with the scale set to 100%. If the new tab for printing does not open, the browser blocked it, and the PDF is downloaded instead. Open that file and print it from there with the same settings.

Cut apart or fold in the middle?

• Cut apart leaves a 6 mm gap between the front and the back. Cut both out and stick them back to back before laminating.
• Fold in the middle puts the front and back edge to edge with a dashed line between them. Cut around the pair, fold along the line, and you have one two-sided card with a single cut.

Each pair sits one under the other, and up to 4 pairs fit on one A4 page.

Aadhaar card size in mm, cm and pixels

This is the standard ID card size, the same as the Aadhaar PVC card and a bank card. Each side is saved at 400 DPI so the small print on the card stays sharp.

Using photos of a physical card

Add one photo of the front and one of the back, or one scan that shows both sides. Take the photos in daylight, with the card flat and the phone straight above it, and avoid flash, which leaves a white glare. Then straighten and zoom each side until the card's edges just touch the frame. The print can only be as sharp as the photo.

What this tool does not do

• It only crops and places the card. It cannot change the name, number, photo, address or any other detail, and you should not try: altering an Aadhaar is an offence. To correct a detail, use the update service on the UIDAI website or visit an Aadhaar centre.
• A home print is a copy, not the official PVC card. UIDAI sells the PVC card through its website if you want a plastic one.
• Some offices still ask for the original letter or the PVC card, so check before you go.

Part of the card cut off at an edge? Zoom out a little and drag the card into the middle of the frame, so its edges just touch the frame on all four sides.