Compress PDF
Reduce a PDF's file size without sending it anywhere. The photos and scans inside are re-encoded on your device while text, links and fonts stay exactly as they were.
Drop a PDF to squeeze
Up to 300 MB. The file is read by your browser and never uploaded.
How to reduce PDF size in three steps
- Drop your PDF on the yellow panel or tap Choose a file.
- Leave Keep text and Balanced selected, or pick a target size if a form has a limit. Tick grayscale for black-and-white scans.
- Press Compress PDF, check the before and after sizes, then download.
What the presets actually do
| Preset | JPEG quality | Longest image side | Good for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Light | 82% | 2,600 px | Printing, portfolios, reports with charts |
| Balanced | 68% | 1,800 px | Email attachments, sharing, on-screen reading |
| Strong | 50% | 1,200 px | Upload portals, archives, phone viewing |
Images that are already smaller than these settings are left alone, and an image is only replaced when the new version is meaningfully smaller than the old one. The document's metadata (title, author, XMP) is cleared, which also removes a little weight and personal information.
Want the reasoning behind all this? How to compress a PDF has an interactive breakdown of where a PDF's bytes live.
Questions people ask
How do I compress a PDF without uploading it?
Drop it into the tool on this page. The PDF is opened by JavaScript in your browser (pdf-lib and pdf.js), its images are re-encoded on your device, and the new file is handed straight back to you as a download. Nothing is sent to our server.
Will the text still be selectable after compression?
Yes with "Keep text", which only touches embedded images. "Flatten pages" and the stronger target-size steps render each page to an image; the result is smaller but text can no longer be selected, searched or read aloud by a screen reader.
Why didn't my PDF get smaller?
Most of a PDF's weight is usually images. A PDF exported from Word or Google Docs with no photos is already compact: its text is stored compressed and its fonts are subset. There is little left to remove without flattening.
Is compressing a PDF safe for signed or official documents?
Re-saving a PDF invalidates any digital signature inside it, as with every compressor. If a document carries a certificate-based signature, submit the original. For scanned forms and ordinary documents, compression is fine.
What about password-protected PDFs?
Encrypted PDFs can't be rewritten until the password is removed. Open it in your PDF reader and save or print a copy without protection, then compress that copy.