Printful vs Printify (2024): The Ultimate Comparison of Printify vs Printful Platforms

Printify vs Printful… which ranks better?

It’s never an easy task to be the judge.

We’ve been asked every so often to give an in-depth summary and recommend the best platform to launch a T-shirt brand.

It’s now easier than ever to custom-print stuff on demand like drawstring bags, hoodies, or cushion covers, in just a click. So far, both Printify and Printful stand as the two biggest print-on-demand services.

But ultimately, this comparison will put a pivotal consideration on the strengths and snags of each print-on-demand solution.

To brief you up.

This guide gives a full account of how Printful vs Printify stacks up in the market. To brief you up on the main segments of the Printful vs Printify debate, we’ll take a closer look at these productive factors:

• Ease of Use
• Pricing
• Order fulfillment
• Customer support
• Print quality
• Integrations

That sort of rounds up what we’re about to review on each platform. We’ll give credit where it’s due, as well as point out all the pitfalls on both Printful and Printify.

What to like about Printful

• Printful has a significant number of unique items to work with
• Has an automated order fulfillment solution
• Integrates with major shopping cart channels and marketplaces
• Printful has a quick turnaround time.
• Centralized fulfillment locations. Printful has warehouses in Los Angeles, North Carolina, Latvia, and Mexico. They’re planning to launch another base in Spain. Since they do in-house printing, drop shippers can sell their print items globally and fulfill orders promptly.
• Its ease of use is up to scratch
• Great, high-quality items
• Printful has a large customer base across the US and Europe

What not to like about Printful

• While the product quality is streets ahead of its printing competitors, Printful’s items are slightly overpriced. You might want to research your customer base to know how much they’re willing to spend on custom branded items.

What to like about Printify

• You can choose your printing provider
• A flexible pricing model
• Over 200 items to choose from
• Items are a bit cheaper

What not to like about Printify

• A limited number of printing integrations
• The branding services are quite limited
• Its print quality is sometimes fluctuating

In the end, you’ll get to know which particular POD solution is right for your soon-to-be, ecommerce business.

But before we share deep insights on these printing services, let’s first define what print-on-demand entails.

Printful & Printify Detailed Comparison

		Printful	Printify
Overview	Founded	2013	2015
	Business model	Owns and operates its own printing and fulfillment centers	Acts as a middleman, connecting you to third-party print providers
	Items delivered	70 million+	65 million+
Pricing	Free to sign-up	Yes	Yes
	Premium subscription	Launching soon	Yes
	Paid plans start from	–	$29/month
Production Techniques	DTG	Yes	Yes
	Embroidery	Yes	Yes
	Sublimation	Yes	Yes
	Cut & sew	Yes	Yes
	AOP	Yes	Yes
Print Network	Choose your print provider	No	Yes
	Print facilities	15+	100+
	Print providers	In-house printing	3rd-party print partners
Fulfillment & Shipping	Average fulfillment time	1-3 business days	2-5 business days
	Average shipping time	2-7 business days	4-12 business days
	Flat shipping rates	Yes	Yes
	Live shipping rates	Yes	Yes
	Custom return address	Yes	Yes
Customer Suppport	Live chat	Yes	Yes
	Email	Yes	Yes
	Phone	No	No
Branding	Product branding	Inside labels, outside labels, sleeve printing, embroidered logo	Neck labels
	Packaging branding	White-label packaging, packing slips, pack-ins	Branding inserts
	White label order-tracking page	Yes	No
Design Tools	Product mockup generator	Yes	Yes
	Embroidery mockup generator	Yes	Yes
	Text Tool	Yes	Yes
	Graphics/clipart tool	Yes	Yes
	Design share for group orders	Yes	No
	Frontend product personalization tool	Yes	No
	Design services	Yes	No
Integrations	Major integrations	Shopify, WooCommerce, Wix, Squarespace, BigCommerce, Square, Ecwid, Weebly, Prestashop, Gumroad, Magento, Big Cartel, 3dcart, Launch Cart, Webflow, Nuvemshop, Shift4Shop	Shopify, WooCommerce, Wix, Squarespace, Walmart, Bigcommerce, PrestaShop
	Marketplaces	Amazon, Etsy, eBay, Storenvy	Etsy, eBay
	API access	Yes	Yes
Products	Product count	330+	850+
	Product type	Primarily focuses on clothing and accessories	Offers a wider range of products, including clothing, home decor, accessories, etc.
	Print quality	Best	Good
	Eco-friendly products	Yes	Yes
	Cheapest T-shirt base price	$6.95	$7.26 ($5.89 with Printify Premium)
Warehousing	Warehousing services	Yes	No
	24-hour fulfillment	Yes	No
Shopify Reviews	Total reviews	4,500+	1,900+
	5 star reviews	3,800+	1,500+
	Overall rating	4.6 stars	4.4 stars

What is Print on Demand?

Print-on-demand, as the term suggests, is an online fulfillment process where the seller works with a supplier to make custom-print items on an order basis.

The supplier, which is mostly a print-on-demand service with a warehouse and an online platform that integrates with the drop shippers online selling channel, customizes white label items under the seller’s brand or a customer's pre-made items.

These items include caps, T-shirts, tote bags, leggings, hoodies, pillows, and curtains. This list goes on and on.

Same as dropshipping, the model allows you not to hold any inventory or pay any upfront fees until a product is sold to the customer.

This makes print on demand the best solution to test a business idea since it has low overheads and a marginal barrier to entry.

If you’ve built an audience whether organically or through campaigns, print-on-demand is an option to help you monetize your content.

It’s easier to create an income stream since you don’t have to deal with the process.

So let’s compare both Printful and Printify a little further to find out which works best for newbies.

How Printful Works?

Printful runs production houses in the USA, Mexico, and Europe. The company covers a large geographical scope to fulfill customers’ orders on time.

To get started, you need to sign up and connect your store to Printful. Why do you need to integrate your shop to this POD service?

Here’s the hint.

Well, it’s accurate to term print-on-demand as any other dropshipping method. As soon as you’re done with all the integrations, you’ll need to work on your custom items using its mockup generator.

You might want to ask– what the heck is a mockup generator?

In all technical terms, the mockup generator is more like a design tool to help you virtually create custom prints for your listed items. It helps you create amazing and high-resolution photos using the suggested templates.

On Printful, you can reach out to any of its categories and pick any of its POD items that you want to upload on your online store. There are over 200 items to choose from.

Printful's high-selling categories

• Clothing: T-shirts, Hoodies, Sweatshirts, Leggings, Shorts, Tank tops, Polo shirts, Long sleeve shirts.
• Accessories: stickers, Phone cases, Bracelets, Necklaces.
• Bags: Tote bags, Laptop cases, Drawstring bags, Backpacks, Fanny packs.
• Home & Living: Coffee mugs, Blankets, Pillows, Posters, Canvas prints, Bean bags, Beach towels, Embroidered aprons.
• Collections: Sportswear, Streetwear, Workwear, Beachwear.

There’s literally a whole library of items to post on your dropshipping store. Printful gives users a multifold approach due to its large volume of custom branding options.

After putting your mockups together, Printful allows you to import all the product designs to your shop. The next step is to promote your items to your target audience and wait for the order automation feature to take effect.

Printful prints, packs, and ships all orders made by customers from your store. The drop shipper has to pay for the shipping and fulfillment costs once an order is fulfilled.

This gets you off the hook from the daunting process of manually designing and shipping orders to your customers.

So basically, two concurrent transactions happen anytime a customer makes an order for a print-on-demand product.

First, you need to draw a pricing formula to set your profit margins. As a result, it’s much easier to have competitive retail prices on your listed items.

The subsequent transaction, which Printful charges, is used to purchase the product and settle the fees.

And that’s it.

So simple. Right?

Here's an extra guide on Printful's overall performance:

Printful Review: Higher Quality Printing and Dropshipping.

How Printify Works?

Printify attempts to make the order automation process as simple as it can.

Same as its top competitor, Printify uses a mockup generator to lessen the burden of designing the print designs. It has easy drag and drop tools that are enormously friendly to beginners.

To create a 3D high-quality product image, Printify has all sorts of color options you can ever think of. There’s also a rich product catalog to work with.

The POD service works with print designers and brands that use state of the art technology to improve on products’ overall quality.

Printify sorts these print-on-demand gurus according to bestselling, location, and prices. So picking the right print provider to fulfill your orders is such a plentiful accessory to your POD dropshipping company.

Its huge directory of items is similar to that of its rival. You can customize your print designs to appear on items such as hoodies, T-shirts, mugs, canvas prints, leggings, and so on.

The option to handpick your printing supplier makes it convenient for both ends; your brand and the customers.

As a dropshipping company, you get to reserve your brand’s authority by working with the most suitable print provider.

You have an option to request for samples. This allows you to feel and make first-hand ratings on the items. If you’re pleased with what you see, you can take a step to the next level and list the variety of items in your shop.

And quite as expected, Printify takes care of the whole fulfillment process. To break out of the deficit territory, the print-on-demand service promises not to fall short of any order management priorities.

Whenever you make a sale, be certain that the quality control is in check and that you can track each shipment.

All that is left for you to decide is the marketing strategy. As far as its mode of operation goes, it seems like Printify runs in the same line of action as its competitor.

Below is a descriptive afterthought on Printify's functionality:

Printify Review: Easy and Quick Way to Create Products With Your Designs.

Printify versus Printful: Pricing

There’s always a significant shift that pricing holds when it comes to picking the right printing solution. As the middleman, you need to factor in whether a POD channel is cost-effective.

That allows you to build momentum when maxing out on the potential profit margin.

You’ll be gratified, or if you prefer, complacent that both companies are outrightly transparent with their pricing. There are no hidden printing fees. You can bank on this fact. A new user doesn’t pay to sign up on their platform.

Both print-on-demand solutions can identify their customers’ imminent needs. And as a result, they don’t charge any membership or subscription fees.

Printful’s Pricing Plans

If you want to sell white-label items without a lot of upfront costs, Printful could be the ideal solution. You don’t necessarily have to spend anything on Printful to access a range of printing features.

The company has a rather generous free plan, which includes access to the Printful design maker with built-in tools and visuals, as well as Printful’s integrations for automatic order fulfillment and shipping.

Plus, you’ll get global order fulfillment managed by Printful’s suppliers, round-the-clock customer support, and an educational resource hub.

Printful Memberships

If you want to leverage some unique benefits from Printful, you can apply for one of their memberships. There are two payment options to choose from: Growth and Business.

Growth Plan

With the Growth plan, you’ll need to earn at least $12k in a 12-month period to be deemed eligible. If you earn enough, after subtracting VAT, taxes, shipping, and discounts, you can apply for access to the following benefits with Printful product:

• Unlimited stores and designs for every account
• Product branding discounts of 7%
• Up to 20% discounts on DTG products
• Up to 30% discounts on other product categories
• Stable pricing commitments

If you haven’t earned enough in 12 months to qualify for the Growth plan, Printful also allows you to pay a monthly subscription price to earn all of the same printing benefits.

When your sales cross over the threshold, you’ll be able to access the bonus features for free for the next year.

Business Plan

Printful Business is the second membership option from Printful, with a lot of the same benefits, such as unlimited designs and stores for every account, as well as consistent product pricing.

It also offers up to 22% off DTG products, discounts of up to 33% on other products, and branding discounts of 9%. Plus, you also get free digitization for all embroidered products, and 25% off sample printing orders.

To be deemed eligible for this printing plan, you’ll need to earn at least $60k in a 12-month period. Printful will calculate your total sum for the year by looking at your order amounts and subtracting any fees, tax, VAT, and discounts.

It does add the cost of shipping services like warehousing and store setup back in, however, as well as any digitization fees.

Enterprise customers can also access custom order fulfillment, production management support, and exclusive perks such as an embedded design maker.

Though Printful has removed most of the information about its costs from the website, we can make some assumptions based on the previous listed information.

For instance, in the past, Printful charged $2.49 per label for each custom label on your items.

Other printing services that Printful offers to drop shippers include:

• Outside label
• Long sleeve print
• Short sleeve print
• Embroidered logo

Printful allows you to create a design that captures your logo and prints it on the packing slips for free. Most sellers use this option to build better a customer relationship, issue discounts, and introduce a new product in the already existing market.

For pack-ins like stickers, business cards, or flyers, you’ll need to pay approximately $0.75 per order. You can opt to pay this small fee to promote your items.

As you can see above, each printing customization has its price.

So how much profit I’m I left with?

That’s a safety concern for all print-on-demand drop shippers. Looking on the bright side, Printful gives you pricing strategies that are proven to work.

There’s a profit calculator to help you descend on the most practical profit margin suggestions. It shows you how much to expect in net profit per product sold.

While there are no limits to Printful product pricing, Printful recommends a 30% minimum profit margin. Printful issues volume discounts to users when they reach a specified amount of sales per month.

Printful – Branding Pricing

	Type	Price
Product Branding	Inside label	$2.49 per label
	Outside label	$2.49 per label
	Short sleeve print	$2.49 per sleeve
	Long sleeve print	$5.95 per sleeve
	Embroidered logo	$2.95 per additional placement
Packaging Branding	Custom packaging	$0.50 per custom packaging used for an order ($25 monthly minimum for storage)
	Pack-ins	$0.50 per pack-in added to order ($25 monthly minimum for storage)
	Packing slips	$0
Website Branding	White-label tracking page	$0

Printful – Warehousing & Fulfillment Pricing

		US	Europe	UK	Canada
Processing & Fulfillment Fees	Product fulfillment fee (per order)	$2.00	€1.75	£1.60	C$2.80
	Product picking fee (per product)	$0.95	€0.80	£0.75	C$1.30
	Pack-in fulfillment fee (per order with pack-ins)	Free	Free	Free	Free
	Pack-in picking fee (per pack-in added to order)	$0.50	€0.45	£0.45	C$0.70
	Custom packaging fulfillment fee (per order with packing)	Free	Free	Free	Free
	Custom packaging picking fee (per packaging used for order)	$0.50	€0.45	£0.45	C$0.70
	Receiving & processing fee	Free	Free	Free	Free
	Packaging materials	Fee varies	Fee varies	Fee varies	Fee varies
	Stock removal fee	Fee varies	Fee varies	Fee varies	Fee varies
Storage fees (per cu. ft.)	1–25 cu. ft.	$1.60	€1.40	£1.30	C$2.20
	25–300 cu. ft.	$1.25	€1.10	£1.05	C$1.70
	300+ cu. ft.	$0.80	€0.70	£0.65	C$1.00
Minimum monthly storage fee	Products	$150	€150	£135	C$210
	Only branding items (custom packaging and pack-ins)	$25	€22	£20	C$35

Printify’s Pricing Plans

Printify has three unique plans. On each package, the drop shipper gets access to these headline features:

• An advanced mockup generator
• Integration with selling channels such as Shopify, eBay, Etsy, WooCommerce, among other online cart solutions.
• 27/7 live support
• Manual order creation.

Free plan

Printify recommends this plan to a merchant who's merely starting their company. There are no limits to the number of product designs you wish to upload to your online shop.

This free account allows you to integrate with up to 5 POD dropshipping stores. There’s nothing more to depend on from this plan. As you know, cheap never comes easy.

Premium plan

If you want to scale up a little further, this is the right package to bank on. It’s ideal for merchants with multiple stores since it has a capacity for 10. Printify charges $29 per month for the premium plan.

This Printify product package is the most popular since the drop shipper gets up to a 20% discount on all ordered products.

The extra perk to consider is that this option gives you access to sell personalized items in your shop. That’s not available on the free plan.

Enterprise plan

To fulfill over 10,000+ orders per day, you’d need to go with the most pricey package. The merchant gets a custom API integration that’s doesn’t limit the number of stores to sync your Printify product account with.

It comes with a dedicated customer support team to help the seller resolve any pitfalls. Printify promptly keeps all the enterprise plan users posted on any new features which they add on the platform.

Printify – Plans Comparison

	Free	Premium	Enterprise
Pricing	$0	$29/month	Custom quote
Number of stores	5	10	Unlimited
Mockup generator	Yes	Yes	Yes
Integrations	Yes	Yes	Yes
Manual order creation	Yes	Yes	Yes
24/7 merchant support	Yes	Yes	Yes
Self-serve help center	Yes	Yes	Yes
Up to 20% discount on all products	No	Yes	Yes
Custom order import	No	Yes	Yes
Early access to new features	No	No	Yes
Custom API integration	No	No	Yes
Dedicated account manager	No	No	Yes
Branded customer support	No	No	Yes

Printful Bestselling Items

Both Printful and Printify offer a huge variety when it comes to choosing the items you want to sell.

These leading print on demand companies are constantly expanding their selections, so you shouldn’t have any problem creating a fantastic portfolio of items.

When it comes to Printful, you can choose from a range of tech accessories, like iPhone covers and earbud cases, as well as home and living items, accessories, and apparel.

If you’re struggling to figure out where to get started, you can sort through the available items using the “Bestsellers” tab, to see what’s currently trending.

The “Bestsellers” option will allow you to filter through items based on the category you’re interested in.

For instance, in the apparel landscape, premium t-shirts and hoodies are quite popular. Some of the other best-selling options you can consider include:

• Wall art (canvases, posters, and prints)
• Blankets and throws
• Drinkware (cups and reusable bottles)
• Accessories like patches and hats
• Phone cases and laptop stickers
• Notebooks, greeting cards and stickers
• Premium T-shirts (with all over print and better materials)
• Hoodies and sweatpants (loungewear)
• Sporting wear (including shoes)

Each option can be customized to suit your specific needs, wand added to your ecommerce shop with a couple of clicks.

You can even create custom packaging for your Shopify store before you start sending items out to your target audience.

Read our dedicated article on Printful's bestselling products.

Printify Bestselling Products

Similar to Printful, Printify offers a range of fantastic products to choose from, in many of the same categories. You can sort through the items available by clicking into the “Catalogue” section and selecting “bestsellers”.

This will show you all of the options currently trending, alongside the options you have for customization, colors, and sizes.

As you might expect, many of the top options for your online company are also some of the cheapest to create.

However, you may need to think about additional costs when figuring out your budget. Think carefully about what you want to get from the fulfillment services you choose, and what kind of delivery times you want to ensure you’re providing to customers.

Some of the top-selling items on Printify include:

• T-shirts, unisex cotton tees
• Heavy blend hooded sweatshirts and crewneck sweatshirts
• Tote bags and backpacks
• Die-cut stickers
• Polyester square pillows
• Sublimation socks
• Homeware like notebooks and posters
• Premium pin buttons
• Extra-tough phone cases

It’s worth looking at all of the options available from Printify (outside of the bestsellers), to make sure you’re selecting items relevant to your target audience and your chosen brand.

There are lots of great options available, ranging from drinkware to technology accessories. You can even create your own seasonal decorations, Eco-friendly clothing, and more.

Plus, there’s the option to choose items specifically assembled in the USA, to increase your chances of faster delivery times.

Product Example Comparison of Printful and Printify (Gildan 5000 Tshirt)

		Printful	Printify	Printify Premium
Base Cost	Monthly Price	$0	$0	$29
	Gildan 5000 Tshirt Price (US Supplier)	$6.95	$9.28	$7.42
	Gildan 5000 Tshirt Price (EU Supplier)	$6.95	$7.79	$6.00
Shipping Cost	Shipping to US (First product)	$4.69	$4.75	$4.75
	Shipping to US (Additional product)	$2.20	$2.40	$2.40
	Shipping to EU (First product)	$4.79	$3.89	$3.89
	Shipping to EU (Additional product)	$1.45	$1.19	$1.19
Total Monthly Cost	Case 1 (50 orders of 1 T-shirt US + 50 orders of 1 T-shirt EU)	$1,169	$1,286	$1,132
	Case 2 (150 orders of 1 T-shirt US + 10 orders of 1 T-shirt EU)	$1,863	$2,221	$1,953
	Case 3 (10 orders of 1 T-shirt US + 150 orders of 1 T-shirt EU)	$1,877	$1,892	$1,634
	Case 4 (50 orders of 2 T-shirts US + 50 orders of 2 T-shirts EU)	$2,047	$2,319	$1,983
	Case 5 (150 orders of 2 T-shirts US + 10 orders of 2 T-shirts EU)	$3,320	$4,063	$3,498
	Case 6 (10 orders of 2 T-shirts US + 150 orders of 2 T-shirts EU)	$3,229	$3,356	$2,811
Monthly Profit (Selling Price: $25)	Case 1 (50 orders of 1 T-shirt US + 50 orders of 1 T-shirt EU)	$1,331	$1,215	$1,368
	Case 2 (150 orders of 1 T-shirt US + 10 orders of 1 T-shirt EU)	$2,137	$1,779	$2,047
	Case 3 (10 orders of 1 T-shirt US + 150 orders of 1 T-shirt EU)	$2,123	$2,108	$2,366
	Case 4 (50 orders of 2 T-shirts US + 50 orders of 2 T-shirts EU)	$2,954	$2,682	$3,018
	Case 5 (150 orders of 2 T-shirts US + 10 orders of 2 T-shirts EU)	$4,680	$3,937	$4,502
	Case 6 (10 orders of 2 T-shirts US + 150 orders of 2 T-shirts EU)	$4,771	$4,644	$5,189

Printify versus Printful: Integrations

Both platforms have in-built APIs to help the merchant integrate with large ecommerce platforms.

Printful and Printify can integrate with Shopify and WooCommerce selling channels. Printful has a longer integration list, unlike its rival. It syncs with other channels such as:

• Squarespace
• BigCommerce
• Weebly
• Ecwid
• PrestaShop
• Big Cartel
• Gumroad
• Magneto
• 3rdcart
• Launch Cart.
• Wix

Printify’s premium plan only connects to two marketplaces; Etsy and eBay. In contrast, Printful makes headway for other product listing platforms such as Amazon, Storenvy, Inktale, Wish, and Bonanza.

If you want to start selling print-on-demand products on ecommerce channels, Printful recommends Shopify, Etsy, Ecwid, and BigCommerce since they’re quick to setup.

Its API automates the order fulfillment process and the plugin is available on the above-mentioned stores.

If you plan to use an enterprise-oriented channel such as Magneto, it’s worth hiring a developer to help you launch your POD shop.

The Printify Popup Store

While Printful outperforms Printify in terms of integrations, Printify does give you a unique alternative to “integrating” the app with an existing store or marketplace.

Users can use a free “pop-up store” creation tool to design a simple online shop just with Printify. 

We think this feature could make Printify a lot more appealing to merchants who don’t want to handle the stress of setting up and managing a comprehensive online site. However, it does have a lot of limitations.

You won’t have nearly as much functionality as you would when creating a store with Wix, Shopify, or Squarespace, for instance.

There aren’t any templates to choose from, and you can really just add your logo to make your store “stand out”. You also won’t be able to use your own custom domain. Instead, you’ll receive a generic “mystore.printify.me” URL. 

All that being said, Printify’s pop-up store does have some attract elements to it. There are no transaction fees when you make a sale, and the website loads really quickly.

It might not be a replacement for a complete online shop, but it could be ideal for those with a low budget, limited time, and very basic online selling needs.

Printful versus Printify: AI Features

AI or Artificial Intelligence is becoming a common component of the ecommerce landscape, and both Printful and Printify are taking notice.

Printful has its “Smart Image Tool”, that uses artificial intelligence to automatically “upscale” images for printing.

This means if you have an image you want to use on a shirt or something similar, but it’s not high-resolution, the AI can upgrade the image for you.

It can double the image DPI for certain designs, and even analyzes the image to see if any information can be added. 

Printify has a slightly different selection of AI tools. First, there’s the AI automated quality control system that uses image recognition and AI to scan a product and evaluate its quality. This helps to ensure you always get a great print. 

Additionally, Printify introduced a generative AI image generator in 2023. This basically uses text prompts (similar to ChatGPT) to create designs for you that you can apply to blank items.

This is an incredibly handy tool for designers who are struggling to come with ideas for new items, or simply don’t have the advanced software available for advanced customizations. 

Printful versus Printify: Mobile Apps 

Another area where Printful has an edge over Printify, is in mobile app design. Printful has both Android and iOS apps available for users, whereas Printify’s app is only available for Android. 

The iOS app for Printful has a great reputation among users, with a current rating of 4.7 out of 5, and thousands of reviews. It also gives you full access to Printful’s product designer.

The Android app, on the other hand, has a slightly lower score (4 out of 5), in part because it misses some key functionality, like the ability to resize design elements and add stock imagery to designs.

Printify has earned more than 100,000 downloads on the Google play store, and it’s relatively easy to use.

The interface is just as clean and simple as it is on the Printify website, and you can access a wide range of great features, to design your items, get samples, or order in bulk while on the move.

Printify vs Printful: Fulfillment and Shipping costs

Both Printful and Printify ship around the world. If shipping takes way longer, your business risks plunging into slow sales. Printful explains in detail- how the entire fulfillment process works.

The process begins right after an order is made. Printful estimates that it can take between 2-7 business days to make apparel items, and 2-5 business days for non-apparel items.

For shipping options, it depends on where the product has to be shipped to. On average, Printful suggests that it might take about 4 business days. Printful hits the target of over 3 million orders each year by working with global carrier companies.

Some of the listed shipping solutions include FedEx, DHL, USPS.com, and DPD. The company has a full-detailed guide on how to calculate the delivery rates.

For print products like T-shirts, long sleeve shirts, crop tops, or tank tops, this is what your customers will need to pay as shipping:

First product

• USA: $3.99
• Europe: $4.39
• Canada: $6.49
• Australia/ New Zealand: $6.99
• Worldwide: $5.99

Additional product

• USA: $1.25
• Europe: $1.09
• Canada: $1.25
• Australia/ New Zealand: $1.25
• Worldwide: $1.25

You can choose to let the customer calculate the shipping at checkout or include it in the retail price. Customs fees may also apply depending on the geographical location where your customer is located.

Printify also fulfills orders using top carrier companies. The company has also partnered with local fulfillment companies to effectively support drop shippers selling items from different corners of the world. The rates on some of these solutions are, however, a bit higher.

Delivery solutions on Printify take longer to deliver international orders since they have fewer fulfillment centers. Here’s a breakdown of the delivery times:

Location

• USA: 7-15 business days
• Canada: 10- 15 business days
• International: 10-30 days

Printify doesn’t explain much about how long it’d take to manufacture a product. Printful, on the other hand, updates, in real-time the delivery rates during checkout.

To take the bad with the good, Printify offers a faster solution for merchants using the Advanced Shopify plan.

Average Shipping Time & Price (Tshirt)

	Printify			Printful
Country	Shipping Time	First Product	Additional Product	Shipping Time	First Product	Additional Product
US	2 – 5 business days	$4.75	$2.40	2 – 5 business days	$4.69	$2.20
Canada	10 – 30 business days	$9.39	$4.39	2-6 business days	$8.29	$1.95
Australia	10 – 30 business days	$12.49	$4.99	2-5 business days	$7.19	$1.30
Rest of the World	10 – 30 business days	$10.00	$4.00	8-21 business days	$11.99	$6.00

Printful versus Printify: Customer support

Printful has a deep-dyed set of tactics to engage with their customers at a more snappy level. The company offers an onboarding session to all new users at no cost.

Its blog section is pretty much resourceful and has useful insights on how to run a successful print-on-demand business. You can give them a call, start a chat, or send an email.

On Printify, you’ll find a help center with articles on important topics like integrations, troubleshooting, items, payments, and mockup designs.

They also run a gainful blog that has tips on marketing, design trends, and success stories. But what makes it fall behind Printful is that it lacks a 24-hour clock live support.

Overall features of Printful and Printify

Which one takes the lead? Let’s find out.

Printful has an organized structure that classifies its services concisely. The Printful online photography service is one rare feature that’s hardly available from other print-on-demand providers.

If you need high-resolution images to help you build your brand’s persona, Printful has got you covered. As we pointed out earlier in this comparison guide, the service offers discounts on bulk orders.

For items that need to be photographed and fulfilled, Printful gives a 20% discount; which sounds like a good deal. They have a stock of pre-made samples so you don’t need to wait much longer to have images for your items.

Printful also promises same-day fulfillment for orders made before noon through it’s automated order processing solution. Best of all features is its pricing calculator which helps users set competitive retail prices.

In comparison, Printify racks up a rich catalog of items. On the contrary, it hits the fan when it comes to design services. Printful steps up with graphic design options for business branding, promotions, and accessories.

Printify vs Printful: Product designs and quality

This was a pretty hard factor to gauge. So I decided to do some research on the internet and gather some user-generated reviews.

Printful has taken a keen interest in hunting for winning product designs in the market. Printify, on the other side, seems like a conventional channel with long-established print-on-demand products like T-shirts and hoodies.

And there’s nothing wrong about that. But the fact is, having a variety of trendsetting items goes a long way.

Looking at the comments online, Printful looks a bit more compelling when it comes to curating merchandise and boosting customers’ confidence in a brand.

The little feedback that I managed to gather regarding product quality happens to rank Printful as a better alternative.

Most complaints point to Printify’s print quality. It’s claimed that some of their apparel products fade and crack within a short time. What could perhaps drive this to happen is the fact that Printify acts as a middleman.

Literally, they don’t do the printing. Rather, they source this service from 3rd party companies; which isn’t the case with their close competitor. Printful has invested so much in printing machines, warehouses, and graphic designers.

With this kind of infrastructure, it’s much easier to maintain the products’ quality.

Printful or Printify for Etsy

If you’re planning on using Printful or Printify to sell products through Etsy, you’re in luck. Both solutions integrate directly with Etsy, as well as a range of other platforms.

You can load your items directly to your Etsy storefront. However, it’s worth remembering Printify gives you more items to choose from in total.

Alternatively, Printful offers some unique products not available from Printify, such as sportswear and certain unique garments.

Additionally, Printify is a somewhat cheaper option than Printful with basic t-shirts starting at around $9.51 compared to $16.51 for Printful.

This could mean you need to charge higher prices with Printful just to earn the same profit margin. On the plus side, both solutions offer high-quality items, made with fantastic materials and high-end printing tools.

Printful or Printify for Amazon

If you’re planning on launching your Print on Demand business with Amazon, one of the world’s largest marketplaces, Printful is the solution for you.

Printful offers a native integration with Amazon, whereas with Printify, you’ll need to find a workaround, such as loading your items onto Shopify and using an integration with Amazon that way.

Overall, Printful offers far more integration options than Printify (around 22 compared to Printify’s 10). Plus, it’s worth remembering that Printful is a more feature-rich tool over all, giving businesses access to a wider variety of branding options, and a comprehensive design tool.

There are even additional fulfillment options to consider, and mobile app solutions.

On the other hand, while creating items and listing them on Amazon is simpler with Printful, it’s important to note that the price of the items can be a bit higher.

This could mean that you need to charge your customers a lot more to make a profit. On the plus side, you only have one set of shipping and pricing details to work with for each product.

With Printify, on the other hand, you need to sort through various competing suppliers to find the right one for your company needs.

Printful vs Printify for Shopify

For entrepreneurs starting their own branded store on a platform like Shopify, both Printify and Printful are solid choices. Both offer integrations with Shopify which allow you to automate processes like managing delivery and sending orders to suppliers.

With both tools, you can link your print-on-demand account to Shopify in a couple of minutes, with virtually no complexity.

Shopify is an excellent tool for online vendors because it offers a wide range of integrations with existing tools, allowing companies to sell both dropshipped and POD items.

Plus, with Shopify, you can access international selling options, and even choose to sell your items in-person using Shopify’s point of sale technology.

One thing we do recommend if you’re going to be using Shopify as your sales platform, is using the company’s “dropshipping starter kit”.

This comes with a three-day free trial, and a $1 subscription for the first month. Additionally, it offers business leaders a range of powerful resources that help you to optimize your print on demand and dropshipping company.

You even get exclusive access to lessons, support, and resources from a private Facebook group, which can give you a fantastic competitive edge when you’re entering a competitive market.

Printful or Printify vs Print Aura

Print Aura is far less effective as compared to Printify and Printful. It branches off from most of the print-on-demand merchants’ expectations.

The website looks static which is a bit off if we picture the pressing need to work with a user-friendly and responsive POD service. Without a savvy platform in place, that would cripple the entire order process by far.

The standard shipping for a T-shirt order on Print Aura only takes between 3-5 business days in the US. If we’re to rank these three services based on shipping speed, it’s clear that Print Aura takes a narrow lead.

Its mockup tool is, unfortunately, not the perfect blend for custom printing. Even worse, the design tool’s page isn’t optimized to load fast. Printful and Printify have taken good care of this key performance indicator.

I’d recommend Print Aura to a beginner who needs a basic punchline of selling bare bone print designs. Its capacity to scale is a bit crappy and their print designs are less fancier than those you’d find on Printful.

You may find selling your brand as an objective that’s within reach but you might miss out on the extra level of workflow precision that both Printful and Printify equally have.

Printify, unlike the two other POD sites, has an option to upgrade to a more advanced plan. On the other hand, Printful is the only service here with a diverse production network.

A drop shipper gets to pick a print designer of their choice. This freedom is limited in both Printify and Print Aura.

Printful vs. Printify vs. Sellfy

Sellfy is another POD with several things in common with Printful and Printify. For starters, it caters to entrepreneurs looking for a relatively simple and effective way to sell POD items.

Sellfy's platform is easy-to-use and comes with a built-in 3d mock-up for testing different designs, adding graphics, and customizing items.

Although Sellfy’s product range is smaller in comparison with 40 products, they provide a wealth of color, size, and labeling variations. In addition, they offer embroidery options, direct-to-garment printing, and eco-friendly material alternatives.

When it comes to shipping, Sellfy boasts an average fulfillment (from printing to delivery) time of five days. However, they warn that sometimes it can take as long as 20 days, particularly in locations outside the US and Canada.

Nevertheless, in 50% of cases, Sellfy ships within three working days, so they may be slightly quicker than Printify and Printful for US customers.

You can't select the fulfillment location of your product, and they don’t specify where their fulfillment centers are, except that they have locations in the US, Canada, and internationally. Sellfy also doesn’t offer native integrations with dropshipping apps or third-party carriers.

Their add-ons are solely for marketing and store management.

That said, Selfy empowers sellers to set up their own fully hosted eCommerce website, from which you can sell digital, physical, and POD items.

However, if you wish to sell your own physical products (i.e., non-Sellfy POD products), you’ll have to arrange the shipping and fulfillment side of things yourself.

That said, for everything Sellfy offers, its price is quite competitive. Their platform equips you with built-in marketing and analytics tools.

Printful vs Printify vs Teelaunch

These three solutions at least have one thing in common. They all have a candid customer support system.

But there’s one ‘out of the way’ fact about Teelaunch. It’s designed to only work for Shopify users. Teelaunch holds a modest position in the print-on-demand market since it’s not as popular as the two captains of the print-on-demand model.

In spite of that, Teelaunch has unique products that are hard to find on other platforms. You can sell rare print items such as branded power banks, shower curtains, UV printed bracelets, kids beanies, monogram gloves, journal hardcovers, jewelry boxes, dog bowls, and so on.

Among the three print-on-demand solutions, I’d rank Printful as the most productive solution in terms of brand designs and quality. Teelaunch being a newbie in the dropshipping model, has a lot of stuff to catch up on.

To reach where Printful stands at the moment, they’d need to invest more in fulfillment centers. Since Printful has more warehouses across the US, they take shorter delivery times as compared to Teelaunch.

If Teelaunch attempts to work on their lead time, then it would be on an equal footing with its competitors. But this would require Teelaunch to have an in-house team for all their delivery priorities.

At the moment, they outsource this service which denies the POD company a greater control on product quality and quick turnaround time.

If we make a head-to-head comparison on the ease of use, all three services seem to have a newbie-friendly interface. They all have an up to snuff reputation when it comes to the ease of use factor.

In terms of pricing, Teelaunch gives the drop shipper a more competitive markup potential without leaving out the quality aspect of all their print designs.

FAQ

Is Printful quality better than Printify?

Both Printful and Printify offer a very similar level of quality. You can access most of the same options from each provider, including eco-friendly items and premium apparel. However, Printify does give you the option to focus on items made specifically within the USA.

Is Printful more expensive than Printify?

Both Printful and Printify don’t require you to pay for a monthly subscription to sign up, so you can start your company with a relatively low amount of capital.
The pricing for each company’s items will vary depending on the quality and type of item you get. A premium t-shirt from Printful will cost a little more than a standard shirt from Printify.

Which company is more popular Printful or Printify?

Printful is a little more advanced than Printify overall. The company uses a slightly more advanced selection of printing technologies, and a good shipping history system. However, it can be more expensive than Printify in some cases.

Which company has better profit margins: Printful or Printify?

Printful can have slightly higher profit margins than Printify, but it all depends on the products you’re getting, and whether you choose to sign up for a premium plan with the brand.
It’s worth taking the time to calculate your possible profit margins from each business before you make your choice.

Printful or Printify – Final Verdict

It’s promising to see how print-on-demand items are receiving an upward trendline in the drop-shipping model.

This comparison would be great for merchants who aren’t only interested in how to start a print-on-demand business but want to launch using a top-notch POD service.

From all the facts we’ve pointed out in this guide, it’s no secret that Printful has an acute edge over Printify.

Since customers are mostly interested in the quality you need to be consistent on each print order. And no solution is better at print quality than Printful.

Consequently, each platform has its pros and downsides. So you want to test both POD services to see which works perfectly on your dropshipping goals.

For that to come about the easy way, you need to perhaps take a stroll on the internet and run a market analysis, order samples, or even better, test these two solutions separately with a demo.

After all, it’s free to integrate both POD services to your dropshipping store. That way, you’ll learn better which service is likely going to make your online store bank more on repeat customers.

If you want nothing else but quality and customer satisfaction, Printful has an unmatched strategy to work with.