Print labels from Excel to a Zebra, Rollo or DYMO printer

Everything is smaller than the label. The viewer is scaling the page to fit a different paper size. Set the paper size to the label size, then set scale back to 100%.

The label prints sideways or only part of it appears. Roll stock is often sold short side first: DYMO calls the 30252 1-1/8 by 3-1/2 in. The PDF page is drawn the way the text reads, 3-1/2 in wide, so if the driver expects the stock the other way round, change the orientation in the print dialog rather than the scale.

Text or bars are cut off at one edge. A driver margin is pushing the page over. Set the margins to zero or none where the driver allows it. Text that sits very close to the edge of a small label is the first thing to lose, so a smaller text size or one fewer line also helps.

The printer skips labels or prints across the gaps. The printer has lost track of where each label starts. Recalibrate it for the roll that is loaded; the printer’s manual gives the steps.

Step 3 offers no blank template for a roll. On a roll the page is the label, so a template would hold nothing but an outline at its edge, with no room for the one-inch reference line that sheet templates carry. Print one real test label instead.

Zebra. ZebraDesigner Essentials, the free edition, covers basic barcode label design. Connecting to Microsoft Excel, Access or text files is a feature of ZebraDesigner Professional, which needs a paid one-time activation key, according to Zebra’s ZebraDesigner page. ZebraDesigner is Windows software.

DYMO. DYMO Connect for Desktop can import .xlsx, .xls and .csv files, but only when the file is stored locally, closed, and Microsoft’s Access Database Engine 2016 is installed. If Microsoft Office is missing, or its bit version does not match Windows, the installer skips that engine and only .udl files can be imported, as DYMO’s help article explains.

Rollo. Rollo says its free label software can import an Excel file and batch print from it. If that already works for you, there is no reason to switch.

Print Labels From Excel takes a different route: it reads the spreadsheet in the browser and hands the driver a PDF. That needs nothing installed beyond the printer’s own driver, and the file is never uploaded.

Code 128 gets longer as the value does, and on a narrow label that means thinner bars. The tool measures every value, widens the barcode when its bars would get thin, as far as the clear space either side allows, and tells you when the narrowest bar drops under 10 mil. Under 7.5 mil it refuses to make the PDF, because those bars would not scan. Runs of digits encode shorter than letters, so an all-number code fits more characters than these counts.

Measured for codes made of letters: the 2.25 × 1.25 in roll stays at 10 mil or wider up to 15 characters, DYMO 30336 up to 14, the 3 × 2 in roll up to 22, DYMO 30252 up to 26, and the 4 in wide rolls up to 31. A ten-character Amazon FNSKU fits every roll size; on 2 × 1 in the barcode is widened from 1.5 to 1.76 in and prints at 12.1 mil or wider. The FNSKU label generator starts with the FNSKU, title and condition already laid out.

QR codes print as a square on the left of the label with your text beside it, and centered on top on the tall 4 × 6 in label. On a 2 × 1 in roll the square is 0.84 in across, and a web address of about 30 characters gives modules about 23 mil wide. Both kinds of code are drawn as vector shapes, never as images, so the edges stay sharp. More on each: barcode labels and QR code labels.