PDF to Word
Get the text out of a PDF and into a .docx you can edit, without sending the file anywhere.
Drop files here
or click to choose from your deviceAccepted: PDF
Up to 3 files per runUp to 20 MB per file5 runs per dayRemove limits with Pro✓ Works offline
Your files stay on your device
This tool runs entirely in your browser. Nothing is uploaded, nothing is stored, and you can even turn off your internet connection before you start.
Example
Example: last month’s PTA minutes turned into a Word file for the next meeting
minutes-september.pdf is one page from the school office: the title in 18 pt, three headings in 13 pt bold and the body in 11 pt. The secretary wants to reuse it for October and has no Word original.
- Pieces of text at the same height are joined into lines, and the size most characters are set in, 11 pt, is taken as the body size.
- A line at least 1.35 times the body (14.9 pt or more) becomes Heading 1, at least 1.15 times (12.7 pt) Heading 2; the rest is Normal text.
- Lines close together at the same left edge are joined into one paragraph, and a word broken with a hyphen at the end of a line, fund- / raiser, is put back together as fundraiser.
| In the PDF | Size | In minutes-september.docx |
|---|---|---|
| Maple Street Elementary PTA | 18 pt | Heading 1 |
| Minutes of the meeting of September 9, 2026 | 11 pt | Normal |
| Attendance, Treasurer’s report, Next meeting | 13 pt bold | Heading 2 |
| The two lines under each heading | 11 pt | One Normal paragraph each |
minutes-september.docx with three Heading 2 sections that show in Word’s navigation pane and editable paragraphs under them: change the dates and amounts and save it as the October minutes.
How it works
- Drop the PDF, or several of them. Each one becomes its own .docx.
- Press Convert to Word. The text and where it sits on each page are read, then put back together as lines, paragraphs and headings.
- Download the .docx and open it in Word, LibreOffice, Pages or Google Docs. Expect to tidy the formatting; the words and their order are the part that comes across faithfully.
Frequently asked questions
- Will it look exactly like the PDF?
- No, and no honest converter can promise that. A PDF stores glyphs at coordinates, not paragraphs, so a converter has to work out what was a line, a paragraph and a heading. This one does that from the positions and the font sizes: you get flowing, editable text with headings marked, on A4 pages broken where the PDF's pages broke. Columns, tables, text boxes, images and exact spacing are not reproduced. If you need the layout preserved exactly, keep the PDF and edit it with the PDF tools here instead.
- My PDF is a scan. Does that work?
- Yes. A scan is pictures of pages with no text layer, so the page is read with the same recogniser the OCR tools use and the words come across as words you can edit. The first scanned file waits for the model to download; after that it is quick. What recognition cannot rescue is a photograph taken at an angle or in poor light — straighten and light the page and the difference is large. Layout is looser than on a text PDF, because a recogniser gives lines and boxes rather than paragraphs.
- Are tables converted?
- Not as tables. A table's cells become lines of text in reading order, which is usually readable but not a grid you can edit as one. Rebuilding real tables would mean guessing the ruling lines, and a wrong guess is harder to fix than plain text.
- Does it handle Japanese, Chinese and Korean?
- Yes, as long as the PDF carries real text. Lines are joined without inserting spaces where the language does not use them, which is the mistake that makes most converted Japanese unreadable. A PDF whose fonts have no Unicode mapping will come out as garbled characters in any converter, this one included.
- Is my document uploaded?
- No. The PDF is read and the Word file written in your browser, which is the reason to use this on a contract, a payslip or anything under an NDA rather than a site that asks you to upload first.
- Why is the Word file A4 when my PDF is Letter?
- Every .docx is written on A4 with 2 cm margins, with a page break wherever the PDF’s pages broke. The text is ordinary paragraphs, so choose Layout > Size > Letter in Word and it reflows onto Letter pages. Word to PDF, the other way round, is on this site too.
- What are the free limits?
- The free plan handles 3 files per run, 20 MB each and 5 runs per day. Pro removes these limits.
Related tools
▦ PDF to Excel The table in your PDF as a spreadsheet, worked out on your device. ▤ Word to PDF A PDF from your .docx, laid out in your browser and never uploaded. ¶ Make PDF searchable The same pages, now with text you can find and copy, made on your own device. ¶ PDF OCR Scans become text you can copy and search, without the document leaving your device.