I’m in love with the Niimbot B21!

Of course it was the vintage design that first drew me to this little thermal printer. I thought it would be perfect, in particular, for printing out One Page Novel titles.

Thermal Printers

Thermal printers have long been in use in cash registers. They use special heat-reactive paper and NO INK, which means that you don’t need ink cartridges, only thermal paper rolls. As such, they’re limited to printing in black (and red, in some cases).

A Word of Caution

Just like till receipts, these printouts will fade within a couple of years, or if subjected to heat. They are, in the true sense, ephemeral, and not suitable for labels, notes, or images that you want to last a long time.

☞ You can look up further information and technical specifications on the Niimbot website.

The Niimbot App

I don’t have experience of other portable thermal printers, but I found the Niimbot app to be extremely well-thought-out and  easy to navigate, and very intuitive in the way it handles page layout. As someone who’s super critical when it comes to UX design, I was pleasantly surprised.

The printer automatically recognises which type of paper roll (“consumable”) is loaded into the compartment, and offers you the correct page template to edit.

It’s a breeze to import photos and PDFs, or to copy and paste text into a template. You can also create your own page sizes and templates, and save them for later use. The “AI” function allows you to take a picture and extract text from it. There’s also an extensive library of fonts and design elements that are free to use.

Does the Niimbot B21 work with off-brand rolls?

Yes, it does. 

I was a bit nervous that regular till roll wouldn’t fit the printer, because the Niimbot brand rolls are 50mm wide while the standard width of thermal roll used in cash registers is 56mm. However, I found that the 6mm difference didn’t bother my little Niimbot.

I will say that I don’t think the print quality will be as good as the Niimbot brand, and the app will complain that there are no “consumables” installed, and that it can’t be responsible for what happens next… I don’t know if some sort of calibration would improve the results, but I found them satisfactory for my needs.

As far as I can find out, Niimbot itself doesn’t offer a “non-sticky” thermal roll. I hope they consider this addition in future, as I think it would be quite popular. Imagine how elegant it would look if they made one with ivory paper… 😍🙌🏻

☞ Till rolls often have adverts printed on the reverse, so you might want to keep that in mind when making your purchase.

Thermal Printers for Writers

Scene Cards

I think these printers are ideal for quickly printing scene cards, and since they’re so portable, I can imagine them being used in group writing or brainstorming sessions for plotting or storyboarding. All you need is a phone to connect to the printer, and optionally a keyboard to make typing easier.

Ink Labels

This is specific to fountain pen enthusiasts, but I found this machine an excellent solution for printing out labels for ink sample vials – especially handy if you want to label your own concoctions or “dregs”. 

Until now I’d been using perforated Muji washi tape for this task, which has the advantage of being easy to remove, but its translucency makes it difficult to read.

An added benefit of the Niimbot labels is that they won’t smudge if they get wet!

Notebook Labels & Tabs

As well as the usual labels to stick on the front of notebooks, or slide into brass bookplates, the Niimbot app has a very neat mirroring feature that you can use to create page tabs to fold in half and stick on the edge of a notebook page.

For example, if you want to divide a notebook up into sections, or you want to mark indices that you frequently turn to.

Author Marketing

If you’re an author who sends out promotional material or processes their own book orders, you can use a thermal printer to print out custom packaging labels, receipts, or thank you notes.

The Niimbot app has a built-in QR code generator which you can use to generate a link to your website, linkinbio card or a social media profile.

Some other ideas

1. Print out a cute or funny fake receipt to accompany a gift.
2. Print out a customised bookmark to gift or to keep.
3. Print out a fake library card when loaning a book.
4. Print out daily trackers (for novel goals or other habits).
5. Design and print paper ephemera from your story world.
6. Save a template for “if found, please return to: _____” labels to stick in the front of notebooks.

P.S. Whoever had the idea to combine cameras and thermal printers to make cheap “instant” cameras is a genius!