How to use PDF to text
- Choose the PDF.
- Pick plain text, or Markdown to keep headings and paragraphs.
- Select Extract text, then copy it or download a .txt or .md file.
How text comes out of a PDF
A PDF doesn't store paragraphs. It stores small pieces of text, each with an exact position on the page, often split mid-word and in no particular order. The tool reads those pieces with pdf.js, the open-source PDF engine used by Firefox, then rebuilds the reading order: pieces on the same baseline become a line, lines are ordered from the top of the page down, missing spaces between pieces are restored from the gaps between them, and a larger vertical gap starts a new paragraph.
Plain text or Markdown
Plain text keeps each line as it appears on the page, with blank lines between paragraphs. Markdown joins the lines of each paragraph into one, rejoins words that were hyphenated across a line break, and turns lines set in noticeably larger type than the body text into headings, with a horizontal rule between pages. Markdown suits pasting into a document editor, a notes app or an AI assistant; plain text suits search and quick copying.
Scans and complex layouts
Scanned PDFs are pictures of pages with no text inside them. When a page has no text, the tool says so and counts those pages, rather than returning an empty file without explanation. Reading text from scans needs optical character recognition.
Tables come out as lines of text with their cells separated by spaces. Pages laid out in two or more columns read across the columns line by line, so for magazine-style layouts expect to tidy the order by hand.
Privacy
The PDF is read in your browser by pdf.js loaded from this site, and the text is assembled there too. Nothing is uploaded or saved.
Common uses
Pulling the text of a report into an AI assistant to summarise it, quoting a passage from a contract, counting the words in a submitted paper, or making a PDF searchable in your notes. For pages as pictures rather than text, use PDF to images.
Questions
- Why is no text found in my PDF?
- The PDF is probably scanned: each page is a picture of text, with no text layer. The tool tells you when that's the case; use OCR PDF to read the text from the pictures and make the file searchable.
- Does it keep the layout?
- It keeps reading order, line breaks, paragraphs and, in Markdown, headings. Tables become lines of text, and pages with two or more columns read across the columns.
- Is my PDF uploaded?
- No. pdf.js reads it in your browser, loaded from this site, and nothing is saved.