PDF to Text Converter
Pull just the words out of a PDF into a plain .txt file that opens in any editor, pastes cleanly anywhere and is easy to search.
PDF Converter
or drag PDF files here ·
Up to 95 MB each· 20 files at once· Removed after 30 min
Your files are removed from our servers 30 minutes after processing.
Scanned PDFs are pictures of pages. Auto runs OCR only on pages without a text layer; On forces it for every page.
The language printed in the scan. Picking the right one noticeably improves accuracy for accents and non-Latin scripts.
Flowing text reflows into normal paragraphs that are easy to edit. Exact layout places every block where it was, which looks identical but is harder to edit.
Where detected tables go in the workbook.
Page numbers or ranges separated by commas, e.g. 1-3, 5, 8-10.
Files are deleted 30 minutes after processingPrivacy policy
- Text layer
- Also called selectable text · embedded text
- The part of a PDF that stores the actual characters, separate from what you see. PDFs exported from a word processor have one; scans usually do not, which is why their text cannot be selected or searched until OCR adds it.
Why plain text is often the most useful output
Most of the time a PDF is only a container for words. You want to quote a paragraph in an email, count the words of an essay, run a translation tool, search a stack of contracts for one clause, or paste a report into a system that strips formatting anyway. For all of that, the layout of the page gets in the way.
A plain text file is the opposite of a PDF: no pages, no fonts, no pictures, only characters and line breaks. The text/plain media type described in RFC 2046 has been around since the early days of email, and every operating system, editor and programming language can read it. That makes it the safest format to hand to a tool whose input you do not control.
Copying from a PDF viewer gets you part of the way, but it breaks lines in the middle of sentences, mixes up columns and fails on scanned pages. The converter rebuilds the text in reading order and uses OCR where a page has no text layer.
From PDF pages to a TXT file
PDF document
Adobe's Portable Document Format from 1993, now an open ISO standard. It fixes text, images and layout so a page looks the same on every screen and printer, and it can carry forms, links and transparency. Every operating system and browser can open it, though editing the content is harder than in a word processor.
- Transparency
- Still images only
- Open standard
TXT
Plain text file
A file that holds characters only, with no fonts, images or layout. Any device and text editor can read it, which makes it the default for notes, logs and configuration. What it gains in reach it loses in formatting, since bold, tables and pictures cannot be stored.
- Open standard
Why convertThis direction throws away everything except the words, deliberately. Choose text when the content will be searched, quoted, counted or processed by another program, and keep the PDF for anything that has to look right.
Line breaks inside a paragraph are joined, so sentences run on as they do in the source, while paragraph breaks stay as empty lines. Page headers and page numbers that repeat on every page can appear as their own short lines, which are easy to delete with a search in any editor.
How to convert a PDF to text
Add the PDF
Drop one or more PDFs on the box above, or press Choose Files.
Leave OCR on Auto
Plain text (TXT) is preset. Text recognition on Auto reads scanned pages and skips pages that already have a text layer.
Convert and open
Press Convert and download the .txt file. It opens in Notepad, TextEdit, VS Code or any other text editor.
PDF to text questions
What is left out of the text file?
Everything that is not a character: pictures, colors, fonts, bold and italics, and the position of text on the page. Tables come through as lines of values separated by spaces.
Why does selecting text in my PDF viewer not work?
The PDF probably has no text layer, which is typical for scans and photos of documents. The converter reads such pages with OCR, so the .txt file still contains the words.
Does the text follow the reading order of two-column pages?
The converter reads each column top to bottom before moving to the next, which matches how people read most articles and papers. Unusual layouts, such as text placed around pictures, may need a quick check.
Can I get the text of only some pages?
Yes. Choose Selected pages under Advanced settings and enter the pages, for example 1-2, 10. The text file then holds only those pages.
Is a .txt file smaller than the PDF?
Almost always, often by a large margin, because fonts and images are dropped. That makes plain text a good format for archiving the words of many documents or for feeding them into search tools.
Should I choose TXT or Markdown?
TXT has no formatting marks at all. If you would like headings and lists marked with simple symbols, choose Markdown (MD) under Convert to instead.
The plain text format
TXT at a glance
- MIME type
- text/plain
- File extensions
- .txt, .text
A text file has no settings for fonts or page size, so it looks slightly different in every editor and on every printer. That is not a defect; it is what lets plain text travel between systems that agree on nothing else.
If you need the words and the structure, choose a richer target. PDF to Word keeps headings, lists and tables as an editable document, and the PDF Converter also offers Markdown, HTML and JSON when the text is headed for a website or a script.
Putting the text to work
A few common jobs show where plain text pays off. Translators paste it into their tools without hidden formatting codes. Researchers keep one .txt file per paper so a desktop search finds every mention of a term in seconds. Editors run a word count on a manuscript that only exists as a PDF proof. Developers feed the files into a script that looks for invoice numbers or dates.
In each case the PDF's layout would only add noise. Fonts, columns and page breaks have to be removed before the real work can start, and the converter does that removal for you in one step for a whole batch of files.
Plain text is also the most durable way to keep the content of a document. Long after a particular PDF reader or word processor has disappeared, a .txt file will still open, which is why archives often store a text copy next to the original.
Scanned PDFs and OCR accuracy
OCR reads the shapes of letters, so the quality of the scan decides the quality of the text. Straight pages, even lighting and a resolution of around 300 DPI give the best results, while photos taken at an angle or faint photocopies lead to more mistakes. Proofread names, numbers and dates, which OCR cannot check against context.
You can convert up to 20 PDFs at a time, each up to 95 MB. Every file gets its own .txt result, uploads are deleted after processing and the text files 30 minutes later. If the source is a photo rather than a PDF, the Image to Text tool reads JPG and PNG files directly.
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