Make a PDF smaller in your browser: compress page images or optimise and keep text
Your files are processed in your browser. They are never uploaded, and nothing is stored after you close the page. How we handle privacy
Runs entirely in your browser. Nothing you type or upload is sent to us or stored.
Keep a copy of your original file. Check the result before you use it. Terms of use
How to Use
- Choose or drop your PDF. It's processed inside your browser, and nothing is uploaded.
- Pick a method: Compress images for the biggest saving (pages become images), or Optimise (keep text) for a lossless rewrite with a smaller saving.
- For Compress images, choose a level: Strong, Medium or Light, or Target size when a form needs the file under a size limit.
- With Target size, pick a limit under Make it smaller than: 100 KB, 200 KB, 500 KB, 1 MB, or Custom to type your own size in KB. The tool tries the best quality first and steps down until the PDF fits. If even the smallest setting is too big, it tells you so: split the PDF or send fewer pages.
- Press Compress PDF and watch the progress, page by page. You can cancel at any time.
- Compare the original and new sizes, then press Download compressed PDF, or Share on a phone. If the new file isn't smaller, download your original instead.
How this PDF compressor works
Upload forms for jobs, exams, banks and government services often set a file-size limit, and email services cap attachment sizes. This tool gives you two ways to compress a PDF. Both run entirely in your browser, so your bank statement, ID proof or mark sheet never goes to a server, and your original file isn't changed.
Method 1: Compress images (biggest saving)
Each page is drawn at a lower resolution, saved as a JPEG image, and placed into a new PDF of exactly the same page size. Resolution is measured in dots per inch (dpi). A PDF measures pages in points, and one point is 1/72 of an inch, so:
A4 (595 × 842 pt) at 110 dpi = 909 × 1286 pixels
A4 (595 × 842 pt) at 150 dpi = 1240 × 1754 pixels
The three levels combine a resolution with a JPEG quality setting:
| Level | Resolution | JPEG quality | Good for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Strong | 72 dpi | 50% | Smallest file; reading on a screen; strict upload limits |
| Medium | 110 dpi | 65% | Email and most upload portals |
| Light | 150 dpi | 80% | Printing, small print, signatures and stamps |
Worked example. A 10-page A4 document scanned at 300 dpi holds 2480 × 3508 pixels per page, about 87 million pixels in all. Redrawn at the Medium level (110 dpi) it holds 909 × 1286 pixels per page, about 11.7 million in all: roughly 7.4 times fewer pixels before JPEG compression is even applied. The final saving depends on what the pages contain, so the tool shows you the real before-and-after size.
The trade-off: after this method every page is a picture. Text can no longer be selected, searched or copied, and clickable links and fillable form fields are removed. That's fine for scans and photos, which were images anyway. It's not fine for a document someone needs to copy text from.
Target size. Instead of a level you can choose Target size and a limit: 100 KB, 200 KB, 500 KB, 1 MB or your own. Each page is drawn once at 150 dpi, then saved at a ladder of settings from 150 dpi at 80% quality down to 50 dpi at 25%, and the best setting whose total fits under the limit is used. If even the smallest setting is over the limit, the tool says so and still gives you the smallest file it could make: a long or detailed document may need to be split.
Method 2: Optimise (keep text)
The PDF is rewritten with its internal objects packed into compressed "object streams" (a feature of PDF 1.5 and later). Text, fonts, images and quality stay exactly as they were. The saving is usually small and some files don't shrink at all, but it can help PDFs made by older software or edited many times.
Which method should I use?
- Scanned documents and phone-camera PDFs (certificates, mark sheets, signed forms): Compress images, starting at Medium.
- Resumes and documents people must read as text: try Optimise first. Many recruitment systems read the text inside a resume PDF, and an image-only resume gives them nothing to read.
- PDFs exported from Word or a website are usually small already. Compress images can make them bigger, because sharp text stored as an image takes more space than the text itself. The tool tells you when this happens and offers your original.
Tips
- Still too big? Try the Strong level, or split the PDF and upload only the pages you need.
- If small print or a signature looks blurred, use Light.
- Open the compressed file and check every page before you submit it.
- For a password-protected PDF, enter the password when asked (Compress images only). The compressed copy won't have a password.
- Very large pages, such as posters and engineering drawings, are drawn at a lower resolution so the browser doesn't run out of memory; the result tells you when this happened.