Smartphones have revolutionized photography, making it easier than ever to capture life’s moments. While keeping photos digitally is convenient, there’s something special about holding a physical print. If you’re looking to turn your digital memories into tangible keepsakes, you might be wondering Where To Print Phone Photos for the best results. This guide explores some of the most popular online photo printing services, comparing their quality, features, and suitability for printing directly from your smartphone.
Top Services for Smartphone Prints: Balancing Quality and Convenience
Navigating the world of online photo printing can be overwhelming. Services range in price, print quality, and user-friendliness, especially when it comes to handling photos taken with your phone. Some services are better equipped to deal with the aspect ratios and unique needs of smartphone photography. Let’s dive into a comparison of several popular options.
Mpix: Popular but Potentially Problematic for Phone Photos
Mpix is a well-known name in online photo printing, offering a dedicated app for easy ordering directly from your phone. Despite its popularity and convenient app, Mpix may not be the ideal choice for printing smartphone photos. User reviews and tests indicate that Mpix photos were not favored in quality comparisons. A significant drawback is its tendency to force cropping on smartphone photos. This can be a major issue if you’ve carefully composed your shots, as important parts of the image might be cut off. For those prioritizing original composition, Mpix might not be the best solution for printing phone photos.
Smartphone-Friendly Alternatives: EZprints and RitzPix
Unlike Mpix, services like EZprints and RitzPix offer more flexibility for smartphone photographers. They understand the common 4:3 aspect ratio of phone cameras and provide print sizes that accommodate this without forced cropping. This means your photos are printed as you intended, preserving the original composition. If avoiding unwanted cropping is a priority, these services are worth considering when deciding where to print phone photos.
Uncropped Options: Printique and Nations Photo Lab
For ultimate control over your prints, Printique and Nations Photo Lab stand out by offering uncropped printing regardless of aspect ratio mismatches. This is ideal for photographers who want complete control and don’t want any automatic adjustments to their images. While the original article doesn’t directly review these two, it mentions them as providers offering uncropped options. For preserving the integrity of your smartphone photos, these services provide the most flexibility.
Bay Photo: Good Packaging, Middling Print Quality
Bay Photo is another service that offers small print sizes suitable for smartphone photos and is praised for its sturdy packaging, ensuring your prints arrive safely. However, print quality tests placed Bay Photo in the middle range. While not the worst, it also wasn’t a top choice in side-by-side comparisons. Bay Photo might be a reasonable option if packaging is a major concern and you’re satisfied with decent, but not exceptional, print quality for your phone photos.
Snapfish: Budget-Friendly but Disappointing Quality and Packaging
If price is the primary factor, Snapfish is often the cheapest service available. However, the low cost comes with significant compromises in print quality and packaging. Tests revealed harsh contrast in Snapfish prints, leading to loss of detail in shadows and highlights. Skin tones in portraits were also reported to have an unnatural orangish tint. Furthermore, Snapfish’s packaging was deemed inadequate. Smaller prints are shipped in flimsy cardboard envelopes without padding, and larger prints, while shipped in tubes, lack internal padding, leading to potential damage during transit.
A damaged print from Snapfish showing a crease on the edge due to poor packaging during shipping.
Snapfish’s packaging for larger prints, while using a protective tube, lacked internal padding, resulting in damage like this crease.
RitzPix: Damaged Prints and High Shipping Costs
RitzPix also faced packaging issues, with reports of damaged prints upon arrival. Despite charging a high shipping fee, RitzPix used thin, inadequate packaging that failed to protect larger prints during shipping. This combination of damaged goods and expensive shipping makes RitzPix a less attractive option, especially when considering where to print phone photos and expecting them to arrive in perfect condition.
Close-up of a damaged corner on a RitzPix photo print, highlighting packaging issues during transit.
Inadequate packaging by RitzPix led to corner damage on this 11×14 print during shipping.
EZprints: Washed-Out Print Quality
Beyond packaging, EZprints also struggled with print quality. Reviews described their prints as hazy and washed-out, lacking sharpness and clarity. This consistently poor print quality makes EZprints less recommendable if you’re seeking vibrant and crisp prints from your phone photos.
Shutterfly: Average Quality, Curled Prints
Shutterfly is a widely recognized service, but it delivered only average print quality in tests. Packaging was also a concern, as larger prints were shipped in tubes, resulting in curled prints that require flattening before display. While not severely damaged like some other services, the inconvenience of curled prints and only average quality makes Shutterfly a mid-tier option when deciding where to print phone photos.
A photo print from Shutterfly exhibiting a strong curl after being shipped in a tube, requiring flattening before display.
Prints from Shutterfly shipped in tubes often arrive curled, needing extra effort to flatten them.
Zazzle: Tedious Ordering Process
Zazzle offers photo printing, but its user interface is designed more for customized, single-item orders. Ordering multiple prints, especially in different sizes, is a cumbersome process involving dragging each image onto a template on individual order pages. This tedious ordering experience makes Zazzle unsuitable for anyone looking to print a batch of photos from their phone.
Flattening a curled photo print using heavy books, a common method after tube shipping.
Heavy items like books can effectively flatten curled prints from services like Shutterfly, though it takes time.
Winkflash: Negative Reviews and Customer Service Concerns
Winkflash faces numerous negative customer reviews, citing issues like lost photos due to ownership changes and poor customer service. Limited customer support options, with only a web form available and no phone or email support, further contribute to concerns. These issues make Winkflash a service to avoid when considering where to print phone photos.
FreePrints: “Too Good To Be True” and Limited Information
FreePrints attracts users with the promise of free 4×6 prints (up to 1,000 per year), but requires using their phone app for everything. The service provides very little information online, raising concerns about transparency and reliability. The adage “if it sounds too good to be true, it usually is” might apply to FreePrints, making it a potentially risky option for printing your cherished phone photos.
Amazon Prints: Decent Quality, Poor Packaging
Amazon Prints offers competitive pricing and a simple ordering process, especially for Amazon Prime members already using Prime Photos. Print quality is described as average, not the best but not the worst, with some reports of orangish skin tones. However, packaging was again a letdown, with prints arriving in thin cardboard mailers that offered insufficient protection, leading to damaged corners. While convenient, Amazon Prints’ packaging needs improvement to ensure your phone photos arrive undamaged.
Walmart: Smartphone-Friendly Size, Limited Selection
Walmart offers a 4×5.3-inch print size, which is designed to print smartphone photos in their native 4:3 aspect ratio without cropping. This is a definite advantage for phone photos. However, Walmart’s overall selection of print sizes is less extensive compared to some competitors. If you primarily need standard-sized prints and value no-cropping for your phone photos, Walmart could be a viable option.
Conclusion: Choosing the Best Place to Print Your Phone Photos
When deciding where to print phone photos, consider what’s most important to you. If uncompromised composition and no cropping are key, prioritize services like EZprints, RitzPix, Printique, and Nations Photo Lab. For budget-conscious printing, Snapfish and Amazon Prints are options, but be aware of potential quality and packaging issues. Services like Mpix and Shutterfly offer convenience but may have drawbacks in cropping or print handling. Ultimately, the best service will depend on your individual needs and priorities when transforming your digital phone photos into physical prints.
