Cheque Printing Online (CTS-2010 Layout)

By the MuftTools.in teamUpdated October 2026How we checkSources: RBI: "CTS-2010 Standard" for cheque forms, specifications (annex to circular of 22 Feb 2010), RBI: validity of cheques reduced to three months (circular, 4 Nov 2011), India Code: Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 (sections 123 to 131 on crossed cheques)

Print a neat cheque from your own printer

Handwritten cheques are slow when you write ten of them for salaries, rent or supplier payments, and a smudged amount or an overwritten date can get a cheque returned. Cheque printing software solves that, but most of it is paid desktop software. This page does the same job in your browser, for free: you type the payee and amount, the tool writes the amount in words, and it prints everything in the right place on your own cheque leaf.

It suits small business owners, shopkeepers, accountants, housing societies, schools and anyone who issues cheques regularly. It works with any Indian bank's CTS-2010 cheque book, because it starts from the layout RBI set for all banks and then lets you fine-tune it for your leaf and printer. Nothing is uploaded, there is no sign-up, and you can save a separate printer setting for each cheque book.

How to print a cheque

1. Enter the date, the payee name and the amount. The amount in words appears as you type, with lakh and crore, in English or Hindi.
2. Choose the crossing (A/C PAYEE is the default), and add a "Not over" limit or a "For company name" line if you use them.
3. Under Printer and alignment, pick how the leaf goes into your printer: on its own page, at the top of an A4 page, or turned sideways for printers that feed narrow paper in the middle.
4. Measure your leaf with a ruler and enter its width and height.
5. Click Test print and print it on plain A4 paper at 100% / Actual size. Hold the sheet over a blank cheque against a window or lamp.
6. If the text is off, enter how many millimetres to move it (minus moves left or up) and test again. Use "Fine-tune each field" if only one field is off, such as the date boxes.
7. When the test lines up, save the settings as a profile, feed a real cheque leaf and click Cheque PDF or Print.
8. Check every value on the printed cheque, then sign it by hand.

Where the fields sit on a CTS-2010 cheque

In 2010 the Reserve Bank of India issued the "CTS-2010 Standard" for cheque forms. Besides security features such as the CTS-INDIA watermark and the VOID pantograph, it mandated the placement of the significant fields, so that cheque images can be read by machines in the Cheque Truncation System. The sample leaf in RBI's annex gives these measurements, which this tool uses as its starting template:

Banks and their printers follow this layout, but the leaf you hold can still differ by a millimetre or two, and so can the spot where your printer puts the first line of ink. That's why the tool has a test print, nudges in half-millimetre steps and a separate date box width setting. The standard also says that no changes or corrections should be made on a cheque except for date validation; if something prints wrongly, cancel that leaf and use a fresh one.

Filling each field correctly

• Date: one digit per box, day first (20102026 for 20 October 2026). A cheque is valid for three months from its date, as set by RBI's circular of November 2011. You can leave the date blank and write it by hand.
• Payee: the exact name on the payee's bank account, such as "Sharma Electricals" or "Ravi Kumar". Long names shrink to fit before the printed "or Order" / "or Bearer".
• Amount in words: ends with "Only" so nothing can be added. Paise are written as "and Fifty Paise" if your amount has them. For a Hindi cheque, choose Hindi to get "एक लाख पच्चीस हज़ार रुपये मात्र". To check any amount separately, use the amount in words converter.
• Figures: the default "**1,25,450/-" style puts stars before and "/-" after, so no digit can be added at either end.
• Crossing: two parallel lines make a crossed cheque, which a bank pays only into an account, under sections 123 to 131 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881. "A/C PAYEE" between the lines is the usual instruction to credit only the payee's account.

Choosing the print mode

Most home and office printers take a cheque through the manual or rear feed slot. If yours has paper guides that close in from both sides, the leaf sits in the middle of the paper path, so choose A4 page, cheque at the top centre. If the guide is fixed on one side, choose top left. Printers that only grip narrow paper in the centre usually want the leaf turned, so try the two cheque turned options. The cheque-size page option makes a PDF exactly as big as the leaf, for printers whose driver lets you set a custom paper size.

Tips and common mistakes

• Always print at 100%. "Fit to page" shrinks everything and nothing lines up.
• Feed one leaf at a time, face up unless your printer's manual says otherwise. Tear the leaf neatly along its perforation first.
• Use black or dark blue ink. Light colours don't scan clearly in clearing.
• Don't print the signature. Sign every cheque by hand after checking the printout.
• For large amounts, ask your bank whether it needs the cheque details in advance under its Positive Pay rules.
• Keep a profile per cheque book. A new book from the same bank usually needs no change, but a different bank might.

Paying many suppliers at once? Paste the list from Excel into "Many cheques at once" and print them in one go, one leaf per page, all with the same alignment. Your list and profiles never leave your browser.