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Conference badge maker
Portrait badges sized for a lanyard, built from your delegate list, printed the night before.
No signup. No watermark. Your data never leaves your browser.
About the conference badge maker
A conference badge hangs from a lanyard, which means it is portrait, it spins around, and it gets read by someone who has about two seconds while the queue moves. The name belongs near the top and set large, because the bottom half of a lanyard badge spends the day behind a jacket, a coffee cup or a folded arm.
The starting layout is 3 × 4 inches portrait with a name, a company, an attendee type and a QR code. Import the registration export as a CSV and every delegate gets a badge from the same design — up to 5,000 rows in one go, in whatever order your spreadsheet was in.
Print them the night before in name order and split the stack by first letter. That one habit does more for the speed of a registration desk than anything on the badge itself.
Your badge data stays in your browser. Names, spreadsheets and photos are never uploaded, and never reach any analytics. Your work is saved on this device only.
Start here
Templates for this
Each one opens in the editor with the fields already set up. Change anything you like.
What goes on a conference badge
- Name
{{name}} - Top third, and the only thing set large. It is read at arm’s length in a moving queue, not across a room, so clarity matters more than size once you are past about 24 points.
- Company
{{company}} - The second most useful line at a conference, because it is what the conversation starts from. One clear step down from the name, not two.
- Attendee type
{{attendee_type}} - Delegate, speaker, staff, press, exhibitor. Put it in a coloured band so a steward on a door can sort people without reading a word.
- QR code
{{email}} - The QR element is pointed at text, and that text can be a variable. It ships encoding the name and company; point it at an email instead and scanning the badge offers to write to that person.
- Pronouns
{{pronouns}} - A small line under the name. Make it an optional column on the registration form so the people who want it get it printed and nobody has to write it on with a pen at the desk.
Anything in double braces is filled in per person. Put {{name}} on the badge once and it becomes every name on your list.
How it works
Four steps, and none of them is signing up.
- 1
Start from the 3 × 4 portrait badge
It is the size almost every lanyard holder takes, and the punched hole sits above the name rather than through it.
- 2
Import the registration export
Save it as CSV first, because .xlsx does not import directly. The column mapping is guessed from your headers, so a sheet with Name, Company and Ticket type columns usually needs nothing done to it.
- 3
Colour the type band
Give each attendee type its own band colour, then print that group as a batch. Filter the spreadsheet by type before each import so you are printing one colour at a time.
- 4
Print the night before
Four badges to a US Letter sheet at 3 × 4 inches. Print one first and check it sits inside your holder with a couple of millimetres to spare before you commit to the run.
The QR code, and the back of the badge
A QR code is only worth the space if scanning it hands somebody something. There is no check-in scanner here, so the code is not a ticket — it is a shortcut for whoever is holding a phone. The default encodes the name and company, which is at least readable. The two versions that earn their place are a link to the delegate’s own page and an address you can write to.
Point the QR at {{email}} and each badge carries that person’s address. Point it at a column of profile URLs from your registration system and each badge gets a different link. Point it at one fixed URL — the schedule, the wifi page, the feedback form — and every badge carries the same code, which is often the most useful option of the three because it is the one people actually scan.
Do not shrink the code below about 20 mm square, which is the size it starts at. Anything smaller wants a steady hand and good light, and a corridor between sessions has neither. Keep it in a bottom corner with a few millimetres of white around it, and never lay it over a photo or a coloured band.
Badges spin, so print the back as well. Lay the design out twice on the same sheet, fold along the top edge, and slide the doubled card into the holder. The reverse does not need the QR — a name and a company at the same size is enough, and it means a badge that has turned around is still doing its job.
- Same code on every badge: the schedule, the wifi, or the feedback form
- Different code per person: {{email}} as an address, or a column of profile links
- About 20 mm square minimum, with clear white space around it
- Print the design twice and fold, so the badge reads from both sides
Conference badge sizes
| Badge | Size | What it is for |
|---|---|---|
| Standard lanyard badge | 3 × 4 in · 76.2 × 101.6 mm | Portrait, and what most lanyard holders are made for. 4 per US Letter sheet. |
| Large delegate badge | 4 × 6 in · 101.6 × 152.4 mm | Trade shows and big rooms, where the name has to read across an aisle. 1 per US Letter sheet, 2 at quarter-inch margins. |
| Landscape badge | 4 × 3 in · 101.6 × 76.2 mm | For holders that hang from two cords. Spins less, but holds fewer lines. |
| Credit-card pass | 3.37 × 2.13 in · 85.6 × 54 mm | CR80. Multi-day passes people keep in a wallet between days. |
Check the insert size of your holders, not the outside of the plastic. A holder sold as 3 × 4 usually takes a badge a millimetre or two under that.
Questions
Where to next
- How to make conference badgesFrom the registration export to a sorted stack at the desk.
- Event badge makerStaff, speaker and crew badges from the same layout.
- How to import a CSV for name badgesColumn mapping, delimiters, and the rows that get skipped.
- Visitor badge makerDay passes for people who are not on the delegate list.
Make your conference badge now
The editor opens straight away. Nothing to install, nothing to sign up for.