Library, print shop or hotel: where should you print?
Three places print most of the world's "I don't have a printer" jobs. They are good at different things.
Library
Best for: a few pages, cheap, no fuss. Weak at: finishing, color-heavy jobs, large formats, anything after closing time. Libraries take email or mobile uploads at most branches and charge per page. Visitors can print without a card almost everywhere.
Print shop
Best for: anything that needs to look finished: reports, binding, card stock, posters, color. Weak at: price for a single page, and hours on weekends. Independent shops and chains both take emailed files or uploads, and they will tell you the price before printing. Turnaround on a small job is minutes.
Hotel
Best for: travelers who need one page now. Weak at: everything else. Front desks print boarding passes and confirmations, often free for guests, and business centers charge per page. Color is rare.
A simple rule
- One to five pages, black and white: library, or the hotel if you are staying there.
- More than that, or anything you would hand to a client: a print shop.
- Photos: a photo kiosk or lab, none of the above.
Finding the nearest of each
Print@ keeps all three in one directory and ranks by distance, so you can see at a glance whether the library is closer than the shop. On a Mac it sends the job from the Print dialog; from a phone, email the file.
Print@ does this from the Print dialog on a Mac: pick Print@ Nearby, and it finds the closest shop or public printer, sends the file, and gives you a pickup code. From a phone, send a file to a Print@ Network shop.
Install on macOSPrint from the webAll guidesQuestions people ask
- Is it cheaper to print at a library or a print shop?
- The library, per page. Print shops are better value for larger or finished jobs.
- Can non-guests print at a hotel?
- Sometimes. Business hotels often allow it for a fee; a polite ask at the desk usually works.