Compress PDF
Shrink PDF files by recompressing images — text stays sharp, nothing leaves your browser.
PDF compression works best on image-heavy files: scanned documents, photo portfolios, reports with embedded photographs, and PDFs exported from tools like Canva or PowerPoint that embed high-resolution images. The compressor extracts each embedded JPEG, reduces its quality and optionally its pixel dimensions, and re-injects the smaller version. Text, fonts, and vector graphics — the elements that make PDFs searchable and sharp at any zoom — are completely untouched. If your PDF is mostly text, compression will have little effect, which is honest: those files are already small because PDF stores text as glyphs, not pixels.
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How to Use
- 1
Drop your PDF or click to browse. The tool accepts any standard PDF — scanned docs, exported reports, or multi-page photo books.
- 2
Choose a compression level. Balanced is the default and works well for most documents. Use Light when image quality is critical, or Maximum when file size is the top priority.
- 3
Click "Compress PDF". The tool scans the file for embedded JPEG images, recompresses them, and rebuilds the document entirely in your browser.
- 4
Review the result — the size before and after is shown, along with how many images were recompressed. Download the compressed file.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much smaller will my PDF be?
It depends on what is inside the PDF. Image-heavy and scanned PDFs — which embed photos as JPEG data — typically shrink 30–70% under the Balanced preset. PDFs that are mostly text, diagrams, and vector graphics will see little reduction, because those elements are already compact and are not touched.
Will text and links still work after compression?
Yes. Only embedded raster images are recompressed. Text glyphs, embedded fonts, hyperlinks, form fields, annotations, and vector artwork are preserved exactly. The compressed PDF is structurally identical to the original; only the image data has changed.
What is the difference between Light, Balanced, and Maximum?
The presets control two things: the JPEG re-encoding quality (how aggressively images are compressed) and the maximum pixel dimension (whether oversized images are also downsampled). Light uses 85% quality with a 2400px cap — nearly lossless. Balanced uses 75% quality with an 1800px cap — a good everyday trade-off. Maximum uses 60% quality with a 1200px cap — the smallest possible output, with visible quality loss on close inspection.
Does this work on password-protected PDFs?
No. Encrypted PDFs cannot be modified. If your PDF has a password, you will see a clear error message. Remove the password first using the PDF password-removal feature of your PDF reader (such as Preview on Mac or Adobe Acrobat), then compress.
Is my PDF safe? Is anything uploaded?
Nothing is uploaded. Your PDF is processed entirely within your browser using the pdf-lib library (MIT license). The file never leaves your device.