PDF to Text
Pull the plain text out of a PDF with our PDF to Text tool. Upload a file or paste the address of a public PDF, choose the first page, how many pages to read and a character limit, and get the text page by page with the document title. Ideal for students, researchers and editors who want to quote, search, translate or reuse the words of a report, paper or manual without retyping them.
Frequently asked questions
How do I extract the text of a PDF?
Upload the PDF or enter the URL of a PDF that is publicly reachable, then click Extract Text. The tool reads the text layer of each page and shows it under a heading per page, together with the page range, the character count and the document title when the file has one.
Can I read a PDF from a URL instead of uploading it?
Yes. Enter an absolute http or https address and leave the upload empty, or upload a file and leave the URL empty, but not both. The download is limited to 10 MiB and follows redirects, and addresses on private, local or internal networks are refused for security.
How many pages can I extract at once?
One run reads up to 50 pages, 20 by default, starting at the first page you choose. To read a longer document, run the tool again with a later first page, for example 51 for the next part.
What does the character limit do?
It caps the extracted text between 1,000 and 200,000 characters, 100,000 by default. When the limit is reached the text stops in the middle of that page and the result says it was cut, so you can raise the limit or continue at a later page.
Why do some pages come back empty?
A page without a text layer, such as a scanned page or a photo saved as PDF, holds only an image of the words. The tool reads text, it does not perform OCR, so such pages are marked as having no text.
Does the tool keep the layout of the page?
It keeps the order and the line breaks that the PDF records, trims each line and collapses runs of spaces into one. Columns, tables and exact positions are not reproduced, so a multi-column layout may come out in the order the PDF stores its text.
Can I extract text from a password protected PDF?
Files that only restrict printing or copying open without a password and work normally. Files that need a password to open are refused with a message; remove the password with a PDF unlock tool first and upload the unlocked copy.
How large can the PDF be?
Uploads and downloads can be up to 10 MiB. Larger files are refused before they are processed, so split or compress a big document first and extract its parts one after another.
Is the document title shown?
Yes, when the PDF stores a title in its document information it appears above the pages. Many generated PDFs have no title or a generic one such as the name of the program that wrote them, in which case nothing is shown.
Are my PDFs stored?
No. The file is processed in memory for this one request and discarded with the result, and nothing about its content is logged. The extracted text only appears in your browser.