Selling printables can be a profitable side-hustle for artists. Maybe you already have some printable ideas, but you are not sure where to sell digital printables. In this post, I show you the best platforms for selling printables, including Etsy and Squarespace, but also other options worth considering. On top of that, you can download a free eGuide with the best selling printables!
Selling printables can be a great side business because you only need to put in a little bit of work upfront and then you can sell the item over and over again. It’s just like selling digital downloads.
When you sell physical products, such as art prints and other tangible items, you have to take care of printing, packaging, and shipping. With digital products, you don’t have to worry about any of that!
There are numerous possibilities where to sell digital printables online and generate a profitable passive income. The most popular place to sell printables is probably Etsy.
Even though it is worth selling printables on Etsy, there are other sites besides Etsy that offer great potential. These include Sellfy, SendOwl and Payhip. Those platforms are specifically designed for selling digital goods.
Squarespace Commerce and Shopify are two other popular platforms for printable sellers. For a cheaper alternative, you can have a look at Pixpa eCommerce, or build your own artist website with WordPress and add an e-commerce plugin like WooCommerce to start selling through your own online store!
Here are the TOP 4 picks of the best places to sell digital printables of your art:
Best Overall
Etsy
1st Runner-Up
SendOwl
2nd Runner-Up
Sellfy
Great Value for Money
Payhip
Without further ado, let’s delve straight into the full review of the best ways to sell digital printables. Here we go:
What are Printables?
Printables are files created by an artist or other creative that people can buy and print out themselves.
These days, printables are quite in demand. People use them for various purposes, like organizing, planning, website creation – or simply to enjoy if it’s for example artwork or inspirational quotes.
Here are some examples of printable ideas to sell:
Printable ideas to sell
- Artwork and photos
- Quotes (with or without artwork)
- Calendar planners
- Project planners (e.g. wedding planners)
- Meal, diet and fitness planners
- Coloring sheets (for kids and adults)
- Stickers
- Templates (e.g. diary and notebook templates)
- Checklists
- Worksheets and spreadsheets
- Stationery
- Grab Your Free Best Selling Printables eGuide
How to sell printables online
Selling digital printables is not as hard as you might think. You don’t need to be a creative genius to make a printable!
All you need is some basic text processing software like Word, Excel, Google Docs or Sheets. Special desktop publishing software isn’t required. But if you already have something like MS Publisher or Adobe InDesign, it can help make your printable creation easier!
A graphic program isn’t a must either, but it can definitely help if you want to create more intricate designs. Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator are surely powerful tools to design your printables, but they are pretty costly.
Don’t worry, here are some free and more affordable options:
- Canva is a free tool to create all types of visuals. They offer a paid version that is still affordable but the free version already takes you a long way.
- CorelDRAW Go is Corel’s new alternative to Canva. For $9.99/month, you’ll get more advanced editing features and access to a library of premade templates and fonts.
- Pixlr provides web-based suite of design tools for both casual and professional editing needs. There’s a free version available; the Premium version for around $9 a month comes with templates, fonts, and other elements.
- Corel Vector is a browser-based vector app with a collection of custom fonts, full Google Fonts library, and a curated collection of professionally-designed creative templates.
Then, what you absolutely need to make digital printables is a PDF creator.
You can create PDFs with MS Office or Open Office for free. But if you want your printables to be editable, so that people can for example tick checklists, you’ll need a special PDF maker. There are several free options and one of the best is PDF Escape.
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Are Printables profitable?
In fact, printables are one of the most profitable digital downloads to sell. They are so popular for a number of reasons.
One reason is that people love custom-made products that are not available in every consumer store.
Then, digital printables are very easy to order online. You can browse through a lot of products before making your decision.
There is such a huge variety on the internet that you wouldn’t find in the physical world.
How much money can you make selling printables?
With that said, there is surely great potential in making money selling printables.
But how much money you can eventually make, totally depends on you! First of all, it depends on the popularity of the digital printables you are selling. Some printables are more popular than others.
That’s why I’ve put together the 60+ Best Selling Printables to help you choose the most profitable niches.
Another factor is your audience. Do you already have a large audience in place that is interested in buying your products? If you don’t have a customerbase yet, you will need to put a bit more work into promoting your products before selling becomes profitable for you.
Last but not least, it depends on the number of items you have on sale. The money artists make selling digital printables varies largely. There are sellers who make between $100 and $400 a month (which is already a nice passive income).
Becky, for example, who runs the site Mombeach.com, made $113.57 in one month selling printables. Another example is Julie from the Millennialboss.com, who earned $341.92 in a month from selling bachelorette party-themed tattoos and digital downloads.
Some of the best selling artists, however, make up to a couple of thousand dollars in a month, some up to $5,000 and more.
Where to sell digital printables?
Once you have the perfect digital printables, it is time to decide where to sell them.
Some printable selling platforms are free, but all will require some type of payment. That could mean they will charge you a monthly subscription or transactions fees.
On the list, you’ll find options that you can add to your website and social media, but also platforms that allow you to create your own online store.
Read through them all, and in the end, pick the one that is best suited to your needs!
Best places to sell digital printables
I’m sure you noticed that both courses that I suggested above focus on how to sell printables on Etsy. (Of course, you can also apply the information to selling printables on platforms other than Etsy.)
This just goes to show that it’s definitely worth selling printables on Etsy!
Etsy is a very popular marketplace for art products of all types. Custom and handmade items are particularly in demand.
It’s super-easy – and free – to create an account, and selling on Etsy is very affordable. You’ll need to pay $0.20 for each item listed. The listing will be up for four months. Once someone purchases your product, you’ll be charged a transaction fee of 5% of the purchase price. If you use Etsy payments, they’ll also collect a 3.5% + $0.25 processing fee. But you can also choose other payment gateways.
Click here to get 40 Free Listings when you sign up for Etsy today!
SendOwl is a top-notch platform that focuses exclusively on selling virtual products and services. You can host and deliver your digital offers through the platform.
Selling digital printables with SendOwl is super-easy. All you need to do is upload your products and add a Buy It Now/Add To Cart button to your blog posts or emails using the generated code. Plus, they have a whole lot of sales and marketing features as well as in-depth analytics – everything you need to start a digital online business!
SendOwl doesn’t charge any transaction fees, but you will have to subscribe to one of their monthly plans, the cheapest starting at $18. Before making your choice, you can start with the FREE 7-Day SendOwl Trial here!
Sellfy caters to all things digital. It’s a profitable way to sell printables, downloads, subscriptions, and print-on-demand products. In fact, Sellfy states that printables for home decor are one of the most popular digital downloads to sell on the platform.
Sellfy allows you to create your own online storefront and customize it to match your artist brand. A custom domain name and web hosting are included in the package. If you have your own website, you can link your Sellfy store to your existing domain with one click of the mouse.
Sellfy allows creators to sell unlimited digital downloads and doesn’t charge any transaction fees.
Pricing starts at $22 per month for the Starter plan. But before committing, you can start with a FREE 14-Day Trial of Sellfy here.
Payhip is a selling platform for creatives of all types. It’s an affordable alternative to the previous selling platforms and offers great value for money. You can sell digital printables on Payhip, downloads, memberships, and coachings, and there’s the option to sell physical products, too.
Payhip lets you choose from a variety of themes to create your custom online store. Email marketing tools and coupon codes are included with all plans, at no extra cost.
In fact, Payhip is one of the least expensive platforms on the list. The Free Forever Plan, as its name suggests, is completely free, but requires a 5% fee on each transaction. Once you start selling more, it might pay out for you to upgrade to the Plus Plan with only 2% transaction fees.
Do you feel this is the place where to sell digital printables? Then get started with Payhip for FREE here!
Squarespace Commerce is probably one of the most popular ecommerce platforms in the market. You can use it to sell physical products (including drop-shipping art prints), but you can also sell anything digital – from printables, to downloads, to subscriptions and memberships.
Squarespace is easy to use and highly customizable. It allows you to create your own website and online store using the visual page builder. All you need to do is pick one of the ready-made templates and fill it with your own content. You can make your site look the way you want, so it matches your artist brand!
You will get powerful selling features, unlimited bandwidth and a custom domain name – all on their most affordable Business plan.
Apart from that, you can integrate various payment options, run marketing campaigns, and send newsletters. To see if this is the place where you want to sell digital printables, test Squarespace FREE for 14 days here!
Shopify is a well-known name in the world of ecommerce — for a reason. You get the most advanced tools and features you could possibly need for running a successful online shop.
That also makes Shopify a popular place to sell digital products of all types. With its customizable themes, the platform allows you to create a beautiful and professional storefront that fits your artist branding. No coding skills required.
You can sell unlimited digital products and automate the order fulfillment. No need to manually send files—everything is done by Shopify. Apart from that, Shopify supports apps like SendOwl, which automatically email the download links to your customers after purchase.
Detailed analytics and tracking tools will show you which of your products are selling well and for which you will still need to promote a bit more. You can set your own prices; commission rates are fair and based on your shop and product.
Printables are a profitable niche and if you plan selling on a larger scale, signing up for Shopify’s free trial is definitely a good idea!
Pixpa eCommerce was made specifically for creatives. It offers an easy-to-use, visually appealing, and all-in-one solution to showcase your art in a beautiful portfolio and sell both physical and digital products.
Pixpa comes complete with everything artists need: website, blog, client galleries, and eCommerce store — no need for separate platforms.
As for digital printables, all you need to do is upload the digital file the the platform. Once someone makes a purchase, Pixpa will instantly deliver it to the buyer.
Unlike Etsy or some other platforms, Pixpa doesn’t take a cut of your sales. You only pay a fixed monthly fee and keep your earnings in full. That being said, Pixpa is probably the most budget-friendly selling platform for artists.
The eCommerce plan only costs $9 per month (billed biannually), which also makes a great option for beginners who want a professional online store without breaking the bank.
If you are also looking for a cost-efficient way to showcase your art and sell digital printables of it, then why not give Pixpa eCommerce a try?
WooCommerce is a plugin for WordPress that allows you to sell both digital and physical products. The good news is that the plugin itself is completely free!
However, you need to have your own WordPress site that needs to be hosted somewhere. Hosting services are payable, but you can get hosting for as little as $2.49 a month. Recommended hosting providers are Bluehost (also endorsed by WordPress itself) and A2 Hosting. For dedicated WooCommerce hosting, check out DreamHost and Pressable.
Creating a website with WordPress is not as hard as you might think, even though you’ll need to invest a bit more time than when using one of the easier website builders.
I’ve built this website on WordPress, too, using the OceanWP theme, and the Elementor page builder, along with Essential Addons for Elementor and Ultimate Addons for Elementor.
I have an entire tutorial on how to make an artist website with WordPress in 5 easy steps, and lots of other useful and free WordPress tutorials, if you’re interested.
Installing WooCommerce is as simple as installing any other plugin. You can customize your store to match your personal brand and offer as many products as you wish.
I am using WooCommerce for my web store as well and I am absolutely happy with it. It was easy to set up and the shop pages look super-beautiful. You can see that it comes with an off-canvas search bar and different filter options.
You will also get lots other features for free, including coupons and discounts, upsells and cross-sells, shipping zones, tax rate calculation, and much much more.
You can find more features on the WooCommerce Marketplace, such as shipping providers, newsletter opt-ins, wishlists, live chats, Trustpilot reviews, printing providers like Printful that will handle physical print sales for you.
In addition to that, you can integrate payment gateways like Stripe and Paypal using Woo Payments.
I recommend WooCommerce for selling both digital and physical products. To learn more, check out my Ultimate Guide To Selling Art On WordPress – WooCommerce For Artists.
- Grab Your Free Best Selling Printables eGuide
Do you still think it’s not possible to make money selling digital printables? Then check out Brandon Timothy’s passive income tutorial on how he made 70K+ selling printable wall art on Etsy!
Thank you Angie for writing this wonderful and honest article about creating printables. You see i’m a 40-ish yr old mother who went back to school in graphic design and i’m finishing my course this december. I’m planning on being a freelancer but my plans were also to create digital items to sell in order to create a passive income. Thank you so much for laying it all out there in black & white, and it didn’t scare me away so that will still be in my futur plans.
Amanda, that sounds fantastic! I think selling digital printables and other downloadable files is always a good idea because it’s so low-maintenance. Once you’ve created your digital item, you can sell it over and over again and create a passive income. Go for it! I’m sure it’ll work just fine (: