If your business uses colored ink for its printed documents and labels, you must know what CMYK stands for and what this strange acronym means.
While it may seem like a simple symbol for ink cartridges, CMYK cartridges have a much more significant impact on your printing equipment and tasks. Continue reading to learn more about what you need to know about CMYK printing.
What It Stands For
Let’s start with the basics. Before we discuss how CMYK printing affects your business, let’s examine what exactly CMYK printing is. CMYK printing stands for cyan, magenta, yellow, and key (black) colors. These ink cartridges have four separate slots for each color and combine to create new colors for printed images and illustrations. Get high-quality cartridges and impeccable printing results from a trusted toner cartridge supplier.
For example, cyan and yellow will blend to produce green ink dots. CMYK ink cartridges will give your printer the most versatile spectrum to create specific colors and shades.
CMYK vs. RGB
Depending on the type of printer your office uses, you may see RGB cartridges rather than CMYK. RGB standards for red, green, and blue. Although the makeup of these two types of ink cartridges is different, the discrepancies between these two inks are slight.
Businesses often only notice that their computer and equipment have CMYK vs. RGB incompatibilities when their printed products look slightly discolored compared to their digital preview. If your company has noticed discrepancies between digital copies of its packaging and labels compared to printed tasks, consider checking your computer and printer to ensure both are set to CMYK.
CMYK+W
Although it might look like a nauseating algebra equation, CMYK+W is a variation of CMYK standard coloring printing. When a printer has CMYK+W printing capabilities, this means that the toner cartridge for this equipment includes white toner.
Although it’s commonly confused as being white ink, CMYK+W toner adds dimension and detail to product labels and packaging. Over the past few years, more and more businesses have leaned toward using equipment with CMYK+W capabilities to utilize white designs in their products.
If your business is interested in investing in equipment with these features, it’s important to note that only white toner is available. White ink does not exist and cannot be recreated through standard ink cartridges’ cyan, magenta, yellow, and black tones. Therefore, ensure that your company can use toner-based printers before searching for white toner design tips.
The Takeaway
CMYK+W is the broadest form of available color printing options. However, businesses can only use CMYK+W with toner-based printing equipment. CMYK itself offers the broadest range of ink colors to create detailed logos and labels.
Lastly, RGB is an alternative ink option to CMYK. Older printing equipment or computers may only register RGB rather than CMYK.
If businesses notice a difference between the colors on their digital screen and their finished product, they should check their computer and printer to ensure both are on the correct setting and synced.
Additional information; you can explore sustainable options like recycling used printer cartridges through services like Sell Toner.
We hope our guide on what you need to know about CMYK printing has been a beneficial resource for you and your business. Although these inks may be fairly technical terms, it’s instrumental that business owners understand the difference between CYMK, RGB, and CYMK+W toner.
The more your company knows about the ins and outs of these ink options, the better your product packaging and labels will be. Your documents, labels, and packaging will all look more detailed and professional with this gained CMYK knowledge.
