Thick Business Cards

Thicker cards feel more deliberate in the hand, survive pockets and wallets better, and give the edge enough width to carry colour or foil. They also take pressed finishes like letterpress and deboss more cleanly, because the sheet can absorb the impression. But thickness isn't automatically better: a 48pt card is harder to fit in a wallet or card case, and it costs more. For most people 32pt is the sweet spot. Go to 48pt when the card is meant to be the statement piece.

Our thickest standard paper card is 48pt cotton, about 1.2 mm, or roughly one and a half credit cards. Three-layer builds bond sheets together for a similar weight with a coloured core on the edge. Metal cards are thinner but much heavier. If you need something thicker than 48pt, ask us for a custom quote and we'll tell you straight whether the extra thickness earns its place.

For a thick card, 32pt (about 0.8 mm) is the best balance: rigid, close to a credit card, and still easy to carry. 48pt (about 1.2 mm) is for statement cards and deep letterpress. A standard business card is 14–16pt, which feels light next to either. If you want to understand the scale in detail, our guide to how thick a business card is covers every weight from 14pt up.

32pt is about 0.8 mm thick and 48pt is about 1.2 mm, so 48pt is half as thick again. In the hand, 32pt feels rigid and 48pt feels like a solid object that won't bend at all. On the edge, 32pt shows a clear line of paint or foil and 48pt shows a band. 48pt costs more and fits fewer cards in a case, so we recommend 32pt for most people and 48pt for a deliberate statement.

According to Vistaprint's own product pages (checked October 2026), their standard card is 14pt, Premium Plus is 18pt and Ultra Thick is 32pt, with a UV gloss front and a matte back. For comparison, our Standard thick cards are 32pt, and our Custom cards go up to 48pt cotton, with hot foil, letterpress and painted or foil edges available on the thick sheet itself.

It will fit a wallet slot, but snugly, and a card case holds roughly a third as many 48pt cards as standard 16pt ones. That's the trade-off for the weight. If your cards live in wallets and get handed out in volume, 32pt is the practical choice: it's close to a credit card and slides in like one.

Yes, on the right paper. Hot foil works on cotton, silk and soft touch. Letterpress, blind emboss and deboss need an uncoated sheet, which on our thick range means cotton, because laminated stocks won't take an impression. Spot UV works on silk, soft touch and cotton. Our Standard thick cards are print-only, so foil and impression work runs on Custom, in about three weeks after proof approval.

Painted edges hold up well in normal use. Paint bonds best to uncoated cotton, where it soaks into the fibres. On silk or soft touch it sits on the cut core and can wear at the corners over time with heavy handling. Because the edges are painted by hand on a clamped stack, expect very slight variation from card to card. If durability matters most, a three-layer card with a coloured core has nothing to wear off at all.

A triplex card is three sheets bonded into one thicker card. The middle sheet shows as a coloured stripe on every edge, so the edge colour is built into the paper rather than painted on. Our Standard triplex is 32pt, white on both faces with a black core, and print-only. Custom three-layer builds let you choose the colours and add foil to the faces.

At 500 cards, our thick cards start at 126 US$ for the Standard triplex and 202 US$ for the 32pt Standard painted edge. Custom cards at 500 run 270 US$ on 32pt silk, 310 US$ on 32pt cotton and 465 US$ on 48pt cotton, before foil, edges or other finishing. The price table on this page shows every card at 250, 500 and 1,000.

Standard ships in 3–4 business days after proof approval (estimate). Custom cards take about 3 weeks after proof approval. Transit is extra and depends on where you are. These are estimates, not delivery guarantees, so if you have a date, tell us before you order and we'll tell you honestly which path can make it.

Yes. Our sample kit includes cards at several thicknesses, plus letterpress, blind emboss, painted edges and raised spot UV, so you can hold 32pt against a standard card. It costs 8 US$ with free shipping within the continental US, and you get a 10 US$ credit toward your first order.

Choose cotton if you want texture and impression: it takes letterpress, deboss and hot foil with a slight bite. Choose silk laminate for bright white, crisp photography and spot UV. Choose soft touch for a velvety matte feel with foil or raised spot UV against it. Silk and soft touch can't be embossed or letterpressed. If you're unsure, 32pt cotton is our default recommendation.