What a dieline is and why your file needs one
Most print jobs are cut on a guillotine in straight lines. As soon as you order something with a custom shape, such as a round sticker, a label with a curved edge, a hang tag with a hole or a small folding box, the printer has to cut it with a die or a digital cutting plotter. Either way, the machine follows a path. That path is the dieline, sometimes called a cutter guide, cut path or cut contour.
When you order custom-shaped print online, the dieline is the part of the file most likely to cause a delay. If it is missing, on the wrong layer, set in a printing colour or a few millimetres off the artwork, the job comes back to you from prepress or, worse, prints with a white sliver along one edge. This guide explains how to set up dielines properly so your file goes through first time.
Where the dieline comes from
There are two situations, and they are handled differently.
The printer supplies the template
For standard shapes (circles, ovals, rounded rectangles, common box styles) many online printers offer downloadable templates with the dieline already drawn. Use them. A template matches the dies or cutter settings the printer actually has, so you avoid paying for a new die or getting a shape that is a millimetre different from what you expected.
You create a custom shape
For a sticker in the outline of your logo, an unusual label shape or a bespoke box, you draw the dieline yourself in a vector program such as Illustrator, Affinity Designer or Inkscape. Raster programs are a poor choice here, because the cutter needs a clean vector path, not pixels. If you are unsure of the difference, our guide to vector or raster files covers it.
How to set up a dieline layer correctly
Printers differ slightly, so always read their file instructions, but these rules are close to universal.
- Put the dieline on its own layer. Name the layer something obvious, such as "Dieline" or "CutContour". Keep artwork on other layers.
- Use a spot colour swatch for the line. Create a named spot colour (often 100 percent magenta, named "Dieline" or "CutContour") so prepress software can identify it. A plain CMYK stroke can be mistaken for part of your design.
- Set the stroke to overprint. This stops the dieline from knocking a white hairline out of your artwork underneath.
- Keep it a single, closed path. One continuous line per shape. Open paths, overlapping duplicates or a shape built from many small segments confuse the cutter.
- Make it thin. A stroke of around 0.25 pt is typical. The thickness has no effect on the cut, but a thick line hides what is happening at the edge.
- Do not fill it. A dieline is a stroke only.
Bleed and safe zone on custom shapes
Bleed works on a shaped cut exactly as it does on a rectangle, only the shape is less forgiving. Cutting always has some tolerance, so the blade may land slightly inside or outside the line.
- Bleed: extend the background colour or image beyond the dieline, usually by 2 to 3 mm all round, unless your printer asks for something else. If you stop the artwork exactly on the line, any small shift leaves a white edge.
- Safe zone: keep text, logos and important detail well inside the line, commonly 2 to 3 mm or more. Tight curves and sharp points need extra room.
- Borders: a thin border that follows the shape close to the edge shows every bit of cutting variation. Either drop it or make it thick enough that a small shift is not obvious.
The same principles for straight-cut jobs are in our article on bleed and safe zones on folded artwork.
Shapes that cut well and shapes that cause trouble
A cutting blade or die has physical limits. Before you commit to a very complex outline, think about how it will behave at production speed.
- Very small inside corners and narrow channels can tear or leave uncut bits, especially on thicker stock.
- Thin protruding parts, such as a fine tail on a letter, break off or curl up on stickers.
- Holes inside the shape (counters in letters, a punched hole on a tag) need their own closed path and should not be too close to the outer edge.
- Smooth, slightly simplified outlines peel and apply more easily than a path that follows every detail of a logo.
A common approach for logo stickers is to draw the dieline as a smooth offset a few millimetres around the logo, with a white or coloured border inside it. The sticker looks clean, the cut is reliable and small cutting variation disappears into the border.
Dielines on packaging files
Boxes and sleeves add folds and glue areas to the cut path. A packaging dieline usually has several line types, each on its own named layer or colour:
- Cut lines, where the blade goes through.
- Crease or fold lines, often shown dashed, where the material is scored rather than cut.
- Glue areas, marked so you keep ink and coatings off them if the printer asks.
- Perforations, for tear strips or opening tabs.
For packaging, use the template from the printer or packaging supplier whenever possible, and print a test at actual size on plain paper. Cut it, fold it and check that the front panel is the front, that text is not upside down on the lid and that nothing important sits on a glue flap. It is a cheap check that catches expensive mistakes.
Exporting the file
When the artwork and dieline are ready, export a PDF that keeps layers and spot colours intact. A PDF/X standard is usually accepted, but check that your export settings do not flatten or convert the dieline spot colour to CMYK. Our guide to exporting a print-ready PDF explains the main settings.
Before uploading, open the PDF and turn on the output preview or separations view in your PDF reader. You should see the dieline as its own named separation. If it shows up as part of cyan and magenta, it will print. Run through our preflight checklist as well, since most rejected files fail on more than one point.
Common dieline mistakes that delay online orders
- Dieline drawn in CMYK and printed as a visible pink line on every sticker.
- Artwork stops exactly at the cut line with no bleed.
- Two overlapping paths, so the cutter goes round the shape twice or reads the wrong one.
- Dieline placed on the same layer as the artwork and flattened on export.
- File built at the wrong scale, often 1:10 when copied from a packaging drawing.
- Template used for a different product size from the one actually ordered.
Ordering custom-shaped print with us
At ePrintingService we cut stickers, labels, tags and short-run packaging to custom shapes, and every file with a dieline goes through a manual prepress check before production. If the cut path is missing, open or set in the wrong colour, we tell you exactly what to change rather than guessing, and we send a digital proof showing the cut line over your artwork.
If you are not confident drawing the dieline yourself, send us your artwork and describe the shape you want. We can create a cut path around your design and add the right bleed. See our printing guides for more on file preparation, or contact us with your file, size and quantity for a quote.
