This is not a bug and it is not hidden. It is written plainly in Gelato’s own help centre, which says: “Orders shipped to the US or Canada are processed in inches. Orders shipped to the rest of the world are processed in centimeters.” The unit you ordered in is not the unit that decides. The delivery address is.
Gelato is also candid about the consequence. Its own worked example says that an A4 poster shipped to the US “is automatically converted to the closest size, 8x12 inches, which has a different aspect ratio. This might lead to slight cropping of the design.”
If you sell printable art to buyers in more than one country, that sentence is the whole story. The same file, the same order, two different crops depending on the shipping label.
What Gelato actually says
Two of Gelato’s own support articles carry the policy. Both were open and readable when this guide was written.
| What it says | Where |
|---|---|
| ”Orders shipped to the US or Canada are processed in inches. Orders shipped to the rest of the world are processed in centimeters.” | What should I do if my poster doesn’t fit into the frame? |
| “an order for an A4 poster shipped to the US is automatically converted to the closest size, 8x12 inches, which has a different aspect ratio. This might lead to slight cropping of the design.” | Can I order a frame or poster in cm in North America, and in inches in the rest of the world? |
| ”To avoid this, we recommend adding a safety margin around the edges of your designs.” | Same article |
The vendor’s own advice, in the frame article, is to order the poster and the frame from the same supplier so the two conversions match. That is sensible, and it is also an admission that mixing suppliers across this boundary is where things break.
What the A4 example does to a real file
Gelato names the sizes but not the arithmetic, so here is the arithmetic. Everything below is our calculation from Gelato’s own stated conversion, not a figure Gelato publishes.
ISO A4 is 21 × 29.7 cm. Gelato’s stated substitute, 8 × 12 inches, is 20.32 × 30.48 cm at exactly 2.54 cm to the inch.
| Width | Height | Ratio | |
|---|---|---|---|
| A4, what you ordered | 21 cm | 29.7 cm | 1 : 1.414 |
| 8 × 12 in, what ships | 20.32 cm | 30.48 cm | 1 : 1.5 |
The substitute is 6.8 mm narrower and 7.8 mm taller. Those are not the same shape, so the printer cannot simply place your file on the sheet. A 1 : 1.5 frame is the more elongated of the two, so filling it with a 1 : 1.414 design means scaling the design until it covers the height and then trimming the sides.
Scale A4 up until its 29.7 cm height covers 30.48 cm, a factor of 1.0263, and the width grows from 21 cm to 21.55 cm. The frame only takes 20.32 cm of that. The extra 1.23 cm has to go, which is about 6.2 mm off the left edge and 6.2 mm off the right, or roughly 5.7 percent of the width.
That is a small number and a large problem, because the things people put near a poster’s side edges are exactly the things that cannot survive being clipped: a signature, a border rule, the last letter of a long title.
The two numbers Gelato gives for frame coverage
There is a second, quieter measurement problem here, and it is worth knowing before you place text anywhere near an edge.
Gelato’s frame specification article gives a worked example: a 12 × 18 inch poster “will have a visible area of 11 7/8 x 17 7/8”. Convert it and the frame is covering 30.48 − 30.16 = 3.2 mm of width in total, and the same 3.2 mm of height, which is about 1.6 mm per edge.
Gelato’s design requirements article says something different: “For framed prints, the frame will cover approximately 4-5 mm (about 0.16-0.2 inches) on each side of the poster.”
Those are both current, both Gelato’s, and they are between two and three times apart. We are not going to pretend to resolve which is right, because we have not put a ruler on a Gelato frame.
What to do with a disagreement like that is straightforward: design to the larger figure. Keep anything that matters at least 5 mm inside the trim on every edge, and the print survives either number.
The practical margins, in one place
Pulling together everything Gelato states about file preparation, converted where the source gives inches:
| Spec | Gelato’s figure |
|---|---|
| Bleed required | 4 mm on all sides. A 300 × 400 mm print needs a 308 × 408 mm PDF |
| Resolution | At least 150 dpi, maximum 300 dpi, at actual size |
| Frame coverage | 4 to 5 mm per side, per the design requirements article |
| Safety margin for destination conversion | Not specified as a number. Gelato says only to add one |
Since Gelato does not give a number for that last row, here is a working one derived from its own A4 example: the conversion took about 6.2 mm off each side. Add the 5 mm the frame can take, and 11 mm of clear space on every edge covers both effects. The A4 case only loses width, but which edge gets trimmed depends on which pair of sizes the conversion lands on, so it is simpler to keep the same margin all the way round.
Before you order a framed print from any print-on-demand vendor
Check whether the vendor converts by destination rather than by the unit you picked. Gelato says it does. Printful’s centimetre ladder, which we measured separately, does not appear to behave this way, though its A4 label carries a rounding quirk of its own. We have not checked Printify or Prodigi, and this guide makes no claim about either.
Order the poster and the frame from the same supplier. This is the vendor’s own advice and it removes the mismatch entirely.
Design to the larger of any two conflicting margin figures. It costs you nothing and it is the only version that is right under both.
Keep the outer 11 mm of every edge clear. Signatures, captions and dates belong inside that line, not on it.
If you sell internationally, test one order to a US address and one to a European address before you list. The difference will show up in the print or it will not, and that is a cheaper answer than a refund.
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