Calibrate your Cricut

You might be wondering, when should you calibrate your Cricut machine. You might be surprised to know that there are really only three times you need to even worry about calibration.

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What does calibrate your Cricut mean?

Calibration in a Cricut machine involves ensuring the machine’s cutting blade is correctly aligned with the design on your material. It helps optimize the precision of cuts by making sure the machine accurately follows the specified paths.

Calibration is crucial for achieving accurate and consistent results in your crafting projects. It typically involves a series of test cuts and adjustments to ensure that the Cricut machine is cutting exactly where it’s supposed to on your material.

When do you need to calibrate your Cricut?

There are only three times you need to calibrate your Cricut machine. This is why when you select Calibration, the image below pops up, and it only gives you three choices.

• When using the Rotary Blade
  • Cricut actually recommends that to get optimal cut performance, sizing, and alignment, you should perform the Rotary blade calibration every time you change your Rotary blade.
• When using the Knife Blade
  • If calibration has not been completed before you attempt your first cut with Knife Blade, Design Space will continually prompt you to complete the calibration process. Once complete, the prompt will disappear.
• When doing Print then Cut projects
  • With print then cut projects, once you calibrate your Cricut you do not have to redo the process, unless you notice that there is a shift in the cuts and they are no longer lining up with your printed project.

What about regular cutting with the Cricut?

There is a HUGE myth and misconception I see in many Cricut conversations, and that is when people are advising others to calibrate their machine when they are not doing one of the three functions listed above. For example, if the Cricut owner is just cutting cardstock or vinyl, there is no need to calibrate the machine.

If you needed to calibrate your Cricut in order to simply cut cardstock or vinyl, Cricut would have put that in the beginner information about setting up your Cricut. When you get a new Cricut machine, there is a QR code that takes you to information to help you complete your first project.

Don’t you think if calibration of the Cricut was needed in order to use the machine for any project, they would have included the steps for calibration in those first project instructions?

How to Calibrate Cricut Machines Video

Because the process for how to calibrate your Cricut is so detailed, I feel that it is easier to explain in a video. In this video I will show how to calibrate your Cricut for Print then Cut projects.

The calibration process with Cricut has improved a lot over the years. If you take some time to just read the step by step directions that appear on the Cricut Design Space screen you will see that the program will tell you exactly what you should do and how to determine if your machine is properly calibrated.

Common Cricut Calibration Questions

Why won’t the Cricut read the sensors on the calibration sheet?

Sometimes that is because the calibration sheet did not print out dark enought. Check your printer settings. Sometimes there is not enough light in your room. Make sure that there is enough light on the area the Cricut is trying to scan. Or there could be too much light, so then the sensor light on the Cricut is not really visible. For this I close the lid on my Cricut to make it darker over the area it is scanning.

Make sure your printer settings follow these guidelines before printing your calibration sheet. Refer to your printer user manual as needed, or reach out to your printer manufacturer, for assistance accessing your printer settings outside of Design Space.

• Print in Portrait mode
• Print with black ink cartridge only
• Make sure the printer is not low on ink
• Select the highest print quality setting (available settings will vary by printer model). This will use more ink and will print more slowly to reduce streaking, but will allow for bright, crisp prints with more even distribution of ink.
• Print only on white, non-textured copy paper
• Do not use narrow margins settings
• Print Layout should be 1 page per sheet 
• Do not adjust page scale (i.e., do not enlarge, do not “fit to page” or “shrink to fit”)
• Do not use edge printing
• Do not center align
• The ideal margins from the top left are 0.5″ to 1.5″ down
• The ideal margins from the top left are 0.5″ to 1.5″ right

Do I only have to calibrate Cricut machines once?

No, you might have to go through the full calibration process several times to achieve an accurate cut. If you ever notice that the cutting seems off while you are doing a project it is good to re-calibrate your machine. Sometimes when there is an update to the Cricut Design Space software you will find that you need to recalibrate your machine.

Calibration and Print then Cut Projects

I am going to guess that if you are reading this information about how to calibrate Cricut Design Space projects you are probably doing a Print then Cut Project. I would even guess that the project is making stickers with your Cricut since that seems to be the most popular Print then Cut project! I have included a link to my sticker making tutorial, along with some other Print then Cut resources below.

Troubleshooting Print then Cut Projects

Making Stickers with your Cricut

Cricut Print then Cut Shirt Design Tutorial

Quick Print then Cut Shirt Project

Print then Cut Puzzle

I even have a mini course you can take to learn even MORE about Print then Cut projects!

Perfect Print Then Cut Mini Course

Let me know if you have questions!