How do you preview how a PDF will look on the page when you print it?

Question

As an example, I want to print an article (PDF) with odd margins 2-to-a-page, double-sided with some percentage of zoom. Now, I have no clue what the best zoom percentage is, but I would like to maximize the size of the letters on the page without overlapping/clipping any of the document.

If I could simply preview the document before I printed it, this would be an easy task. However, it seems like the only way for me to know whether my page is going to be cropped or not is to just print a page, tweak settings, and iterate until I'm satisfied.

EDIT: I will leave the title so the given answers might be useful to searchers. However, I'm particularly interested in printing two-to-a-page WITH zoom adjustment. I can perform this action using the Win7 system dialog (but get no preview); and I can perform these actions separately in Adobe with a preview (but not simultaneously).

Solution

As everyone has so far said, it all depends on which app you use for printing it. Of course, Microsoft Edge, Firefox and Google Chrome are useless in this case. So, I am assuming you use the most popular choice, Adobe Acrobat Reader DC.

Here is a screenshot of its Print command:

In this case, I am about to print an A4 document on A3 papers, two-to-one as you asked. To do so:

1. Click on "Properties" button next to the printer name and choose a paper size.
2. In the paper sizing and handling, choose the "Multiple" button.
3. From the settings that appear, adjust "Pages per sheet" and "page order".
4. Preview the result to the right.

If what I gave above is unsatisfactory, adjust and preview until you find the settings of your dream.

Here is another example: I have upsized an A4 PDF to cover a whole A3 paper, thus increasing its size to 137%.

Comments

[FoxMcloud5655]

First of all, what program are you using to view said PDF's before they are printed? Adobe Acrobat Reader?

[Alex P. Miller]

@FoxMcloud5655 I print from SumatraPDF which just invokes the system dialog. I'm open to using any third-party app if it works. (ideally free, but honestly I would pay for a good solution to this).

[Chris Rogers]

Adobe Reader (free from adobe.com/downloads) provides a print preview for me, allowing me to adjust to 'fit to page' or 'actual size' etc. and seeing the change in the preview

[FoxMcloud5655]

Ideally, I agree with using Adobe Acrobat Reader for this because it's free, but if it doesn't do what you need to do...

[Alex P. Miller]

Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately, with Adobe, I can't seem to do both two-to-a-page AND adjust the size simultaneously. This makes the handy preview feature useless in this particular case for me.... Maybe the answer is to first print to file a zoomed PDF, and then print that result two-to-a-page. But again... this makes the goal of finding the optimal zoom a rather frustrating procedure.

[Admin]

@alexpmil You are saying you can't do what I already did in the first screenshot? Mind if you post a screenshot of what you get? We can help you better that way.

[bertieb]

Welcome to Super User! Please read how to recommend software in answers, particularly the bits in bold; then edit your answer to follow the guidelines there. Thanks!