DTG
Direct-to-garment printing
DTG prints your artwork directly onto the garment with water-based inks, so photographic detail and gradients come through without setup fees for each design.
How it works
Direct-to-garment (DTG) printing works like a large inkjet printer built for apparel. The garment is pretreated, your design is printed with water-based inks straight onto the fabric, and the print is heat-cured so it becomes part of the garment.
Because every print is produced from a digital file, there are no screens or plates to make. That makes DTG a natural fit for print-on-demand: one design or one hundred designs cost the same to set up, and every order can be a different piece of artwork.
Advantages
- Unlimited colors, gradients and photographic detail in one pass
- No per-design setup, which suits one-off orders and large catalogs of designs
- Soft hand feel: the ink sits in the fibers rather than on top of them
- Well suited to cotton and cotton-rich garments
Best for
- Detailed artwork, illustrations and photos
- Designs with many colors or gradients
- Stores with many designs and unpredictable demand
- Light and dark cotton tees, sweatshirts and hoodies
Good to know
- Best results come on 100% cotton or high-cotton blends; polyester-heavy fabrics are usually better served by DTF
- Very large solid areas of bright color can look slightly softer than screen printing
- Exact color reproduction depends on the garment color and fabric; designs are printed as supplied
Suitable products
Blanks that suit DTG
These product types are commonly suited to this method. Browse the catalog to see the products currently available.
Have a design in mind?
Send us the artwork and the product you are thinking of and we will confirm whether DTG is the right fit.