3 Out of 5

Sharpcast is a fairly young competitor on the photo printing service scene. This growing business has a lot to offer with plenty of room to grow. But there’s more to Sharpcast than just printing digital photos.

Using the Site
Sharpcast works best when you upgrade to a paid account. They also have a new upcoming service which will allow you to sync your photos and documents across all the computers and mobile devices you use. However, they do have a free account which you can still use to organize and order prints from your digital photos. It is this free service which this review focuses on.

Signing up for a free Sharpcast account is quick and easy, and comes with 10 free prints. After those are used up you can expect to pay 17¢ per 4×6 print. Uploading photos is easy, and you can organize them into albums at your convenience. Once your photos are organized you can invite your friends and family (via email) to view them online.

Sharpcast does not offer any editing tools online for its free account holders. In order to use Sharpcast’s editing tools you must download their photo management software to your computer.

Sharpcast has an online storage policy called “30 day originals.” This policy holds your original photographs online for 30 days, after which they are reduced to 1600×1200 resolution, enough for 5×6 size prints. In order for Sharpcast to keep the original size photos, you must sign up for their paid service.

Ordering Prints

Sharpcast’s free service does allow you to order prints. You can choose the size and quantity of your prints and whether you want them in matte or glossy finish. We ordered 23 prints from Sharpcast, using standard shipping (7-14 days), and paid $2.75 for shipping cost. We placed our order on a Monday and received the prints two weeks later. The prints arrived in sturdy cardboard packaging and were printed on Fujicolor Crystal Archive paper.

Print Quality
The prints we received from Sharpcast were generally good quality. However, they had a slight red tint and were a little dark for our tastes. The cropping, though, was not too bad for not having allowed us to have any say in it.

Conclusion
Online Service & Sharing: 3 out of 5
Print Quality: 3.5 out of 5
Overall: 3 out of 5

Sharpcast’s free online service could add some more features, and we’ve received better print quality from other services. However, their paid accounts, software, and other services are interesting and could have a lot more to offer. Sign up now for a free account and get 10 free prints!