Compress a PDF
Reduce a PDF's file size, right in your browser — most often to get it under an email attachment limit.
Drop a PDF here, or click to browse
Processed in your browser — nothing is uploaded
About this tool
This tool shrinks your PDF by re-rendering each page at a reduced resolution and quality, then rebuilding the file — the same basic idea professional compressors use, done here entirely on your device. It works especially well on scanned documents and image-heavy PDFs, which are usually the largest files to begin with.
The trade-off: because each page becomes an image, text in the compressed PDF is no longer selectable, searchable, or copyable — only the visual appearance is preserved. If you need to keep text searchable while still reducing file size, this page also offers an optional server-based compression mode that recompresses embedded images without flattening the text.
Choose "Smallest size" when you just need to get under a size limit and don't care about maximum visual quality, or "High quality" when you want a meaningful size reduction while keeping pages looking sharp.
Frequently asked questions
- Will the compressed PDF's text still be searchable?
- Not with the default browser-based mode — pages become images, so text is no longer selectable or searchable. Use the optional server-based mode if that matters for your file.
- How much smaller will my file get?
- It depends heavily on the original file — scanned or image-heavy PDFs typically shrink the most, sometimes by 70% or more. PDFs that are already mostly plain text may not shrink much with this method.
- Is my PDF uploaded anywhere?
- No, not by default — compression runs entirely in your browser. The optional server-based mode does upload the file for that specific conversion.