Looking for Picaboo reviews to help in choosing a photo book printing service? If you're planning to create and print a digital photo book, looking for photo book reviews is a good way to start-- because every photo book priting service has something unique to offer.

Here, I'll go over every element of Picaboo's products and services, and how they rate, including their:

Photo Book Software

Ease of Use and Design

Backgrounds and Designs

Photo Editing Capabilities

Photo Book Sizes, Paper, and Quality

Support and Customer Service

Picaboo Customer Reviews

Picaboo Overview

Picaboo is one of the most popular photo book printers around. They is probably because they're one of the higher quality photo book producers-- their books start at a higher price point than many other photobook printers, but also start with a higher quality point and with a wider variety of covers, backgrounds, etc.

This printer is a popular choice for people looking for a high level of quality and design. It's generally not the first choice if you're looking for budget photo books.

Screenshot: Picaboo X Photo Book Software

The most important part of this Picaboo review is probably the software-- because it's this that most differentiates one photo book printer from another.

Picaboo has been working awhile on a new software that is also Mac compatible and they have just released it - called Picaboo X. There is a lot that is totally different with this software release, but they continue to offer one of the most flexible software packages available.

The biggest change with this release is that there is only a 8 MB software download --very small and quick-- and it operates on an Adobe Air platform. The previous software version was a hefty 114 MB download. While it's a shame they don't offer an on-page option for designing a photo book, it's actually pretty amazing that they can offer so much with their software when there is such a small download.

Another fun feature added to the new software at Picaboo is the ability to post your photo books on your Facebook page.

Click here to download the software for free and give it a test run yourself.

With the Picaboo X photo book software, you start your design process from a bookshelf that shows you all of the books you have made. You can edit a book, or choose the new button and go from there.

After your installation, you always start your design process by clicking on the desktop icon to see your bookshelf. Your first choice is the theme, and then you choose the pictures you want to use in the book. You can choose to arrange these one-by-one yourself, or have them auto-arranged by the software.

The Photo Preview Feature: Once you have chosen your pictures and are in the picture tray, you can hover over a picture to see it a little bit larger, or click on it to have it enlarged. It makes it pretty simple to find and arrange specific photos. I was recently making a book with a friend and she was having trouble seeing who was in a picture she was trying to place in her book - and that photo book printer's software did not have any picture preview at all. So this is a great feature that you might not appreciate until you do not have it.

Using Picaboo for a Photo Book Business

Picaboo is also a good option for those looking to design photo books professionally for others, as the "share" capability within allows you to send off a particular design for client review before actually placing your order.

In any of my previous Picaboo reviews, I've always noted that Picaboo offers more backgrounds than anyone else. But they now include those backgrounds right into the software. You have an unlimited number of backgrounds available to you in their photo book software. You can make a nice-looking photo book page page from the thousands of backgrounds and themes, or you use any photo to create a full-page bleed.

There are a greater variety of layouts than any other photo book printer's software (to my knowledge, anyway), and you can expand on that by being able to add as many pictures that you want to a layout, move any of the pictures, and expand the size of any picture box. It's pretty intuitive to use.

Picaboo's picture editing feature uses such tools as zoom/crop, rotate, white borders, and shadows to make your photos look just right. You can remove red eye and adjust brightness and contrast very easily. You can use almost any color for your fonts, or even for backgrounds by using a color "picker" that lets you grab any color in your picture or background-- it's pretty flexible. No, Picaboo's photo editing features aren't ever going to rival Photoshop... but for most users they don't need to.

This is one of the only places in this Picaboo review where this photo book printer falls a little short: Picaboo only offers three sizes of books (see chart below).

But they do have several book types. The basic types include the typical die-cut books along with a custom photo cover. Then there are high quality books (Cape Cod, Modern, Victorian, Madison, and Ranch) which are printed using a 110 lb. matte paper, rather than the 100 lb. glossy used on their other books. The pages in these higher-quality books also lay-flat, eliminating the bending that occurs when normal pages are sewn directly into the spine. These all come at a much higher price, though. For more information on pricing, see our Covers and Sizes page.

The "Wedding Flush Mount" is the highest quality photo book at Picaboo. If you're looking for a premium, thick book feel – this is one of the best on the market. The books come in two sizes – an 11x8.5 and a 14x11. Both are landscape orientation. The pages lay completely flat and extend across the entire page. You can choose from six leather cover colors. For more information on this, visit our wedding page.

Customer support for the Picaboo website is excellent. "Live Chat" was put to the test on a Sunday night at 11:00pm and I received instant feedback-- so it actually worked as well as they claimed. If you do not need help immediately, you can also contact Picaboo by email, and they do reply promptly.

However, one thing I didn't like: if you try to use the chat feature outside of their schedule, or when it's down, the email option they give you instead doesn't work all that well. The one I tried to send got no confirmation or response. So if the chat's down, I'd suggest going directly the the Email section.

Picaboo Review Updated: August 1, 2010

Visit our Picaboo Coupon Codes Page to see any current deals and promotions at Picaboo.

Or: Click here to directly to Picaboo, where you can download the software and do a free test-design.

Want to Know More?

This Picaboo review focuses mostly on the site itself, the product line, and software that you use to make a photo book. For customer reviews the quality of and satisfaction with the photo book itself (or the quality of individual customer service experiences) please go to Photo Book Experiences. Here you will find what other people have said about different printer/publishers. You can also check out my run-down of reviews for each individual printer.

Or go to the bottom of this page to read and share experiences and reviews of Picaboo's products and services.

Go from Picaboo Reviews to my Photobook Publishers Page.