Print Contacts from Address Book on Your MacBook

By Mark L. Chambers from MacBook All-in-One For Dummies, 2nd Edition

For those moments when you need an archaic hard copy, Address Book offers a whopping four different formats for printing your contacts: mailing labels, envelopes, lists, and even a snappy pocket address book!

By default, Address Book prints on standard U.S. letter-size paper (8-1/2 x 11 inches) in portrait orientation. You can change these settings right from the Print dialog: Choose File and click Print or press Command+P. From the Print dialog, you can choose exotic settings, such as legal-size paper or landscape orientation.

Follow these steps to print your contacts:

Press Command+P.

Address Book displays the Print dialog. To show all the settings, click the Show Details button at the bottom of the sheet.

If you need more than one copy, click in the Copies field to specify the desired number.

Need labels? Click the Style pop-up menu and choose Mailing Labels to specify what type of label stock you’re using on the Layout pane. Click the Label button to sort your labels by name or postal code, choose a font, select a text color, and add an icon or image to your labels.

To switch to a standard contact list, click Style again and then click Lists. (You can also print envelopes and pocket address book pages in a similar manner — just choose the desired entry from the Style pop-up menu.)
Select the desired Attributes check boxes to specify which contact card fields you want to appear in your list.

The Attributes list appears only if you’re printing contacts in either the Lists style or the pocket address book style.
Click the Print button to send the job to the selected printer.

Alternatively, you can create a PDF file in a specified location — a handy trick to use if you’d rather not be burdened with paper, but you still need to consult the list or give it to others. (PDF files are a special document display format developed by Adobe; they display like a printed document but take up minimal space.)

To display the contents of a PDF file in Mac OS X, you need only double-click it in the Finder window, and the built-in Preview application is happy to oblige. Even faster, select the PDF file in the Finder window and press the space bar for a Quick Look.