How to make a certificate for every name on a list
Last updated 27 September 2026
Fifty people finished the course, and each needs a certificate with their own name. Typing fifty names into fifty copies takes an afternoon and brings typing mistakes. With the design and the list you already have, it takes a minute.
What you need
The design, saved as a PDF: make it in Word, Canva, PowerPoint or anything else, and leave the places for the name and course empty. The list, in Excel, a CSV file or an OpenOffice sheet, with a heading on the first row - Name, Course, Date - and one person on each row below.
The same works for anything with names on it: letters, badges, invitations, place cards.
Put the names on the design
- Open Certificates from a list.
- Drop the design PDF on the first box, and the list on the second. It says how many lines and which columns it found.
- Click a column button, such as Name, then click on the certificate where the name should go. The name of the first person appears there, centred on the spot.
- Do the same for Course, Date or any other column.
- Drag any line of text to move it. Change its size, its letters (serif or sans, bold or not), its colour, or whether it lines up left, in the middle or right.
If your design is a fillable form
When the design PDF has form boxes, and a box has the same name as a column - a box called Name, a column called Name - it fills itself in, centred in the box. There is nothing to click. Any box left without a column is listed, and you can choose one for it.
Check the long names, then make them
- Change the number next to Showing line to look through the list, especially the longest name. A name too long for its place is made a little smaller so it still fits.
- Choose All in one PDF to print them all in one go, or One PDF each, in a zip to email each person their own. For one each, choose the column to name the files after.
- Press Make the copies, then save the PDF or the zip file.
Names in Arabic are written right to left, and names with accents keep them. Both the design and the list stay on your computer.
Badges: several on one sheet
For small items such as name badges, make them all in one PDF, then open Pages per sheet to print two, four or more on each sheet of paper, ready to cut out.