Does your coffee table look a little bare? Perhaps there’s a gap on your bookshelf that you’re desperate to fill? Or, just maybe, your phone’s precious memory is being throttled by thousands of pictures that you just can’t get rid of? Sounds like it’s time to get yourself a photo book from Printique, the company that we think makes some of the best photo books for specific occasions. Fully customizable, fast shipping, and good customer service, we’ll explore everything you need to know about Printique in our review.
Printique: Pricing
The hardcover Printique 8 x 8 photo book costs $49.99, a price point that’s higher than most of the other providers, however what you pay you get back in quality. Standard shipping costs align pretty closely with its competitors though, adding around $10 to the total. As with the standard for photo books Printique starts with 20 pages per book, with the option to add pages. Pages can only be added two at a time, the cost for which is $2.00, and while it seems expensive this is a decent price when compared to other services, who charge similar rates for a single additional page. In terms of value, Shutterfly is cheaper, but something like Artifact Uprising is a little more expensive, so this sits in the middle of the range.
Printique: Quality & Services
For our sample book, Printique used thick lustre pages with a photo-like finish, so all of the photos look like they could be originals. The cover is noticeably thicker and sturdier than most competitors’ books and the pages lay flat rather than sticking up at the crease. The lay-flat feature is usually an expensive extra with other companies, but that was just part of the normal book with Printique. The quality was good enough that we assumed the price would also be much higher, but it wasn't. There were more expensive photo books in our comparison that did not have the same quality. This service does not offer 8.5 x 11 sizes so we ordered the next closest size: 8 x 10.
Printique's online service was not perfect, though. The selection of backgrounds and pre-designed books is good but not great, though the ones we found are attractive. The lack of a flyleaf is a slight drawback, but the thickness of the pages and the cover will ensure that the book is protected for ages. You can add a flyleaf but it costs extra.
Printique: Book options
Printique offers 14 book sizes, more than any other service we tested. Even with all of those choices it still lacks a few of the most common sizes, like 11 x 14 and 8.5 x 11, but there are sizes close to that so you should be able to find a size that fits your vision.
Cover type selection is decent with this site, though there are sites with more. Printique offers a great range of cover materials that other providers cannot match. Leather, cardstock, fabric, metal, and hardcovers are all available for you to ensure the best cover for your photo collection. And now with the mini softcover option you can create a handy, smaller, photo book at just 4 X 4, starting from as little as $9.99.
Softcover options have become the affordable and chic option for when you want to save a little on your project. Starting from $19.99, Printique uses 100% recycled uncoated paper, to give you one of the most sustainable options available on the market. Its softcover choices allow you to create something affordable and eco-friendly.
Printique offers a lot of choice in terms of paper with eight paper types to choose from, you can get the gloss look, matte finish, or even a textured picture for that professional feel.
You start the book creation process by choosing the theme of your project. You can then upload photos from your computer, social media or photo sharing sites like Flickr and Amazon Photo. The software places the photos automatically, or you can place each picture manually. If you don’t want to use one of the many pre-designed layouts, you can create a book from a blank slate with your own templates and layouts. The software allows you to choose your own photo placement and embellishments as well as edit your photos using its design tools.
The edit interface looks daunting at a first glance, and definitely takes some getting used to. Printique wants to cater to photographers as much as amateur snap artists, and so the layout is similar to popular photo editing softwares. It's far less feature-rich, though, so won't be used by professionals. If you aren’t tech savvy, then it won’t be the easiest photo book site to navigate. That being said, the edit options are numerous, and comprehensive.
With the ability to save, and return, or share and allow others to help out, Printique makes it easy to involve as many people as you’d like (which is helpful if you struggle).
Printique: Support and user reviews
Printique averages three days for processing and printing your photo book. It offers overnight, two-day and international shipping so that you can get your photo gift as soon as possible.
There are a few different resources for technical support, including video tutorials, FAQs and user forums. You can also call customer support or send an email if you have questions after looking over that information. Unfortunately, Printique is yet to add a live chat function, a popular way of interacting with customer support, this leaves you with the slower options for issue resolution.
With an impressive rating of 4.6/5 rating on TrustPilot, Printique is one of our top-rated photo book providers. Nearly 90% of users have given a five star rating, and the reviews reflect an impressive dedication to quality: “I couldn't be happier--beautiful paper and photo quality”, and customer service “Absolutely fabulous customer service - helpful and professional”.
Should you use Printique?
Printique occupies a middle-ground between some of the other photo printers we tested, and doesn't excel at any one thing. However, it has good shipping options, decent pricing, and a good variety of sizes and templates for its books. The quality of product is decent too, although certainly not the best.
On the negative side, the creation tools on the site are a little more difficult to use than most of its competitors, and while there are many different book sizes, some of the most common options are absent here.
If you shop with Printique you'll get a quality product at a good price, but you'll find different aspects of the whole experience more satisfying via other providers like Mixbook - our top overall pick.
