How to extract text from a PDF
- Drop one PDF into the box above or press Browse files.
- Keep line breaks for code or tables. Turn them off for flowing paragraphs.
- Tick the page marker option if you need to cite page numbers.
- Press Extract text and check the word count.
- Copy the text or download it as a .txt file.
What this PDF to text tool gives you
- The whole document in one pass instead of page by page copying.
- Text in reading order from the text layer and not raw drawing order.
- A choice between original line breaks and flowing paragraphs.
- Optional page markers for citations and references.
- A word count so you can check the result fast.
- A plain message when a file is a scan with no text.
Two kinds of PDF and only one holds text
This point explains almost every question about PDF to text tools.
A PDF made from a word processor, a web page or design software holds real characters. Each letter sits at a spot on the page with font details attached. Drag across a paragraph in a reader and it highlights. That is the text layer. This tool reads it directly.
A PDF made by a scanner or a camera holds photos of pages. To a computer it contains no text at all. It holds only pixels that look like letters to a person. A drag across a line highlights nothing. No extractor can pull words from that because no words exist in the file.
How to tell which PDF you have
- Select test: try to highlight a sentence. If it highlights, you have a text layer.
- Search test: search for a word you can see. If search finds nothing, the page is an image.
- Zoom test: zoom in a lot. Real text stays crisp. A scan turns blocky.
A scan needs OCR to become text. OCR studies letter shapes and guesses what they are. This tool does not run OCR. It tells you so instead of handing back an empty file. Have a scan? Export the pages with PDF to PNG. Then run them through the image to text converter.
Should you keep line breaks?
A PDF stores text placed on a page and not as flowing paragraphs. A printed line ends because the layout ran out of width. It does not end because a sentence finished.
| Setting | Best for |
|---|---|
| Keep line breaks | Poetry, code, tables and layouts that carry meaning |
| Join lines | Word processors, translators and word counts |
A reflow later is tedious. The right choice here takes one click. Still need a tidy? The line break remover and the text cleaner finish the job.
PDF to text for Bengali, Hindi and other Indic scripts
These scripts need an extra step. Several vowel signs appear to the left of their consonant on the page. In stored text they must come after it. A PDF hands back characters in the order it drew them.
Left alone, the Bengali word for Bangladesh comes out jumbled. The vowel sign sits in front of the wrong letter. Almost every word on the page suffers the same way.
This tool puts them back in order. It moves the vowel past the whole consonant cluster and not just the first letter. So joined letters survive. In our test on a real Bangladesh Railway ticket it fixed 61 of the 67 misplaced vowel signs.
No tool can fix a few of them. Some PDFs map joined letter shapes to private codes. The file records no real letter for those shapes. The tool reports how many characters it could not recover.
Why tables come out jumbled
A PDF stores a table as words placed at spots on the page. It has no rows or columns. So the extract gives you a stream of words in reading order. Table structure cannot survive.
Common PDF to text problems and fixes
Words run together with no spaces
Some PDFs place each letter on its own. The spaces exist only as gaps on the page. Try the other line break setting. If that fails, use OCR on page images.
Strange symbols appear
The PDF uses a custom font map. Run the text through the text cleaner to strip odd characters.
Who uses a PDF to text tool?
Students pull quotes from research papers. Writers move old drafts into a new editor. Translators feed text into translation tools. Analysts copy numbers from reports. Bloggers count words in a document before they repost it. The word counter helps with that last job.
Your document stays on your device
The tool reads the whole file inside your browser. It uploads nothing. Contracts, reports and unpublished work never leave your computer. Need the pictures from the PDF too? Try extract images from PDF.