Spot UV Business Cards

How Much Do Spot UV Business Cards Cost

Spot UV business cards cost $76.88 for 500, which works out to about 15 cents a card, and the price per card keeps dropping as you order in bulk. A run of 2,500 lands near 5 cents each, and at 50,000 you are down around 3 cents a card. The gloss coating is included in that price, with no separate setup fee for the shine. The 13 tiers below give the total for each run from 500 to 50,000.

This card starts at 500, so plan for a quarter of meetings and events rather than a week. Set the slider below to that count and read the running cost. For a team, split one order into as many as 10 name sets, each with its own name on the front and the same gloss layout.

What Is Spot UV on a Business Card

Spot UV means a spot application of a UV-cured gloss coating. The press lays clear gloss over only the shapes you choose, then cures it under ultraviolet light so it sets hard and glassy. You get 5 ways to place it: gloss on the front only, gloss on the front with a fully glossed back, gloss on the back only, gloss on the back with a fully glossed front, or spot gloss on both sides. This card keeps the gloss smooth and flat to the surface. If you want the coating built up thick enough to feel under a fingertip, the Raised Spot UV Business Cards add that raised layer instead.

Which Stock Makes the Gloss Pop

Spot UV works by contrast, so the base stock matters as much as the coating. You pick from 3: a 14pt Gloss Cover, a heavier 16pt Gloss Cover and a 16pt Silk Laminated Cover. Most buyers choose the silk laminated cover, because its soft matte surface makes the clear gloss look sharper than it can on an already shiny card. For that velvety feel on its own, the Silk Laminated Business Cards and the deeper matte of our Soft Touch Business Cards give you the same base without the gloss accents.

Spot UV Design Inspiration

Five placements are available, and each one gives a different card. Here is what people actually mask, and what each choice does when the card is picked up.

• Logo mark only. The mask covers the symbol and nothing else, so the matte card stays quiet and the mark is the one thing that catches the light.
• Full flood back. The front carries the printed information and the whole back is coated, so the card flips from matte to a mirror-bright face.
• Pattern. A repeating shape masked across the card reads as texture rather than as a printed graphic, and it works on a back that is otherwise blank.
• Type only. The name or the company glossed, everything else matte, which keeps the card readable and still gives it the light catch.
• Both sides. Masked front and masked back for the cards you hand to the people you most want to remember it.

Sizes, Corners, and Two-Sided Printing

These print at the classic 2" x 3.5", which fits a wallet or cardholder, and you can round the corners at a 1/8" or 1/4" radius, or leave them square, for 3 corner options in all. Print full color on the front and leave the back blank, or run full color on both sides for room to put your logo and spot gloss up front with your details on the back. The specs below list each stock, coating placement and corner option.

How Fast Can You Get Spot UV Cards

Spot UV business cards print on a 5 business day turnaround, and 99.8% of all 4OVER4 orders ship on time. The UV-cure step is what sets the timeline, since the gloss has to harden under the lamps before the cards are cut and boxed. Before you order, you can turn on a free online proof to check exactly where the gloss lands on your art, so the shine sits on your logo and not a stray edge. Pick the production speed that clears your deadline below.

After the 5 production days and the UV cure, the cards still have to travel. Enter your ZIP code below to see the ground-shipping window to your door, then count back from your event or meeting to the day you need to approve the proof.

Design Your Card, or Start From a Template

Start from a layout in our business card design templates, set your colors and copy in the online editor, then mark which elements get the spot gloss. On a spot UV card, gloss the logo and one short line and leave the rest matte, so the shine stands out against it. The layouts below are a good place to start.

Run your own design software? Skip the editor and grab a press-ready blank instead. Each blank business card template is built at the real 3.5" x 2" trim with the bleed and safe margin already drawn in, and the spot UV blank template adds a separate layer to mark exactly where the gloss goes. Download the one that matches your file, drop your art in, and upload.

The gallery below shows spot UV cards our customers printed with us, on the three stocks and across the five gloss placements, so you can see how a glossed logo or a flooded back looks in print before you order. Tap any print to see it larger.

How Does Spot UV Compare to Other Finishes

Spot UV gives a premium look at a moderate price. A raised coating adds a texture you can feel, glitter adds sparkle and foil adds metal. The chart below puts spot UV cards beside those siblings, including the sparkle of Glitter Spot UV Business Cards, with the starting price of each.

Get Your File Print-Ready the First Time

Good design is only half the job. The other half is a clean file, and spot UV adds one extra step most reprints come from: the gloss mask. Run through the do's and don'ts below before you upload, on resolution, color mode, bleed, the safe margin, and how to mark the spot UV layer, and your cards clear preflight on the first try, with the gloss exactly where you drew it and no surprise crops.

Spot UV File Setup Guidelines

The press needs two files for a spot UV card: the artwork you want printed, and a separate mask that tells the coating unit exactly where the gloss lands. Build the mask like this and the job runs the first time.

1. Start a separate layer for the mask, sized to the same 2" x 3.5" document as the artwork, with the same bleed and the same margins.
2. Fill every shape you want glossed with 100% K on a white background. Black means coat, white means leave alone. No greys, no tints, no transparency.
3. Keep the mask in register with the art. A shape on the mask has to sit at the identical position and size as the element it glosses on the printed side.
4. Draw the mask as vector shapes or live type. A flattened screenshot or a soft-edged raster blend gives the coating unit no clean edge to follow.
5. Name the files so the pair is obvious, for example front-art and front-mask, and send one mask per printed side you are glossing.
6. Send both files together in the same upload, along with the placement you chose, so the mask is never matched to the wrong side.

Your free online proof shows the mask position before the job goes to press, so check the gloss shapes against the artwork there rather than after delivery.

Minimum Line Weights and What Not to Gloss

Spot UV is a coating laid over a printed sheet, so it holds detail well but not infinitely. Keep the masked shapes solid enough for the coating to sit on and the edges stay crisp.

• Give strokes real weight. Hairlines and the thin joins inside a fine serif can break up or read as a rough edge once coated, so thicken them on the mask or leave them out of it.
• Set glossed type larger than your body copy. Small text with fine counters is the first thing to lose definition under the coating.
• Design for a little movement. The coating is applied as a second pass, so allow tolerance rather than butting the gloss edge exactly against a printed edge, and avoid outlining printed type with a gloss shape of the same size.
• Skip gradients on the mask. Gloss is on or off, so a soft fade turns into a hard edge wherever the mask stops being solid.
• Gloss the shapes people recognize from across a desk: a logo mark, a monogram, a name, a pattern, or a whole side flooded.

Explore the Rest of Our Business Cards

If raised gloss, glitter, foil or a plain matte card fits better, the cards below list each finish in our business cards printing range with its starting price and a link to its page. The wider business stationery collection and the full print product range cover the rest.

Customers who order spot UV cards often add the products below to the same order, each shown with its price.

Why Print Spot UV With 4OVER4.COM

At 4OVER4.COM, quality comes first, and it's backed by a satisfaction guarantee and 25+ years of printing since 1999. Pick the stock and the gloss placement, and each card arrives with the gloss exactly where your mask put it. The numbers below come from all of our orders.

Print your spot UV business cards today, and for any questions reach 4OVER4 support at 1-718-932-2700 or support@4over4.com.

Spot Gloss Business Cards Are Spot UV Cards

Some printers call this finish spot gloss, others call it spot UV. It is the same thing: a clear gloss coating laid over chosen areas of the card and cured hard under ultraviolet light. Whichever name you searched for, this is the card. The gloss sits flat and level with the surface, over any of 3 stocks, with 5 placement choices from front only to both sides.

Two things separate the names in practice. Raised spot gloss, or raised spot UV, is a thicker coating you can feel under a fingertip, and that is the raised spot UV business cards product rather than this one. Spot gloss on a matte base is the classic pairing, which is why the 16pt Silk Laminated Cover is the stock most people pick here: the soft matte around the gloss makes the shine read sharper. Pricing starts at $76.88 for 500 cards on a 5 business day turnaround, and the coating is included in that price.