PDF to Word:
Converter

How to convert PDF to Word

1. Click Choose files, or drag one or more PDFs onto the drop area. Each PDF becomes its own .docx file.
2. Conversion starts straight away with Editable text, all pages and pictures included.
3. To change Result, Pages or Include pictures, use the settings panel, then click Apply to all files.
4. Click Save next to a file, or Download all (.zip). The document opens in Microsoft Word, Google Docs, LibreOffice Writer and Pages.

What the settings do

• Result. Editable text (the default) rebuilds the document so you can type into it. Exact look (pages as pictures) places each page as a full-page picture, so it looks exactly like the PDF, but the text can’t be edited. Use it for forms, certificates and designed pages you only need to print or annotate.
• Pages. Leave it empty for every page, or type a list such as 1-3, 5 to convert only those pages.
• Include pictures. On by default. Photos and figures are cut out of each page and placed after the text above them, scaled to fit the page. Tiny images such as icons and bullets, and full-page backgrounds behind text, are skipped. Turn it off for a text-only document.

What comes across in Editable text mode

A PDF only records where each piece of text is drawn, so the converter works the structure out from the page. Larger lines become Word headings (Heading 1 to Heading 4), which means Word’s navigation pane and table of contents can use them. Bold, italic and text sizes are kept, and the most common font in the PDF is matched to a Word font such as Times New Roman, Arial or Calibri.

Bulleted lines become a Word bullet list, and numbered items keep their numbers. Centred, right-aligned and justified paragraphs keep their alignment, and first-line and hanging indents are copied. Web addresses become clickable links.

Text set out in aligned columns becomes a real Word table with thin grey borders. Numbers are right-aligned, and a bold first row is marked as a header row, so Word repeats it when the table runs onto another page.

Each PDF page starts a new page in Word, with the PDF’s page size and margins, and landscape pages stay landscape. Running headers, footers and page numbers that repeat on every page are left out, so they don’t end up in the middle of your text.

What doesn’t survive

For a document full of complex design, Exact look keeps the appearance and you can type notes on top in Word.

• Text colours and underlining. The text comes out in the normal colour without underlines; bold and italic are the formatting that carries over.
• Multi-column layouts. Newsletters and two-column papers become one column of text in reading order.
• Vector drawings. Charts, diagrams and shapes drawn with lines rather than stored as pictures are left out.
• Merged table cells. Tables are rebuilt as a plain grid, so a cell that spanned two columns lands in one of them.
• Exact line endings. Word reflows the text, so lines and pages can break in slightly different places than in the PDF.

Common problems and fixes

• You see “This PDF has no text layer (it may be a scan)”. The pages are pictures, so there’s no text to rebuild. Use Scanned PDF to text (OCR) and set Save as to Word document (.docx) to get the words as an editable file.
• The PDF is password-protected. Remove the password with Unlock PDF, then convert the unlocked copy.
• Letters come out as gibberish. Some PDFs use fonts that don’t map their shapes to real letters. The page looks fine, but only OCR can read it: try Scanned PDF to text (OCR).
• A table came through as separate paragraphs. Only text in clearly aligned columns is turned into a table. For figures you want to calculate with, PDF to Excel is the better tool.