Compress a PDF without the upload wait
Three presets, one honest trade-off between size and quality. On a real 208-page, 93 MB document we measured 63 MB at the recommended preset and 2 MB at extreme.
Drop your PDF here to start
to use Compress PDF (free, no account)
Files stay private: PDFs and images are edited in your browser.
Measured, not promised
On a 208-page, 93 MB real-world PDF: recommended preset → 63.2 MB (−32.3%), extreme preset → 2.05 MB (−97.8%). On a 26-page, 6.4 MB file: −62.9% and −73.5%.
Three clear presets
Light keeps quality near-original, recommended balances size and readability for everyday sharing, extreme pushes for the smallest possible file.
Runs in your browser
Compression is done by the MuPDF engine compiled to WebAssembly, on your device. No upload queue, no server-side cap.
Three presets, and the numbers behind them
Every figure here is what our compressor returned on a real 208-page, 93 MB document.
Pick the trade-off
Light for print-bound files, recommended for everyday sharing, extreme when the document simply has to fit under a limit.
Measured, not promised
The recommended preset cut our reference document by a third; extreme took the same file to 2 MB.
Or set the knobs yourself
The advanced panel exposes the image DPI, the JPEG quality and font subsetting, so you can aim at a size instead of a preset.
Text stays sharp, images shrink
The megabytes are in the embedded images, so those are what get re-encoded. Text is vector data that costs almost nothing, and it is left alone.
Where the megabytes actually go
Most oversized PDFs are image-heavy: high-resolution scans and photos embedded at far more detail than a screen needs. Compression re-encodes those images to sensible levels while leaving text, which costs almost nothing, perfectly sharp.
Choosing a preset
Start with recommended. On image-heavy documents it typically cuts the size by more than half with no visible difference on screen.
Use light for print-bound files where every detail counts, and extreme when the goal is simply to fit under an email or upload limit.
- Light, minimal re-encoding, near-original quality.
- Recommended, the everyday choice: −32% on our 208-page test file, −63% on a 26-page office document.
- Extreme, smallest file: 2 MB on the 208-page test file (−98%).
Done in three steps
Upload your PDF
Drop the file above, it is read locally in your browser, never uploaded to a server.
Use the tool
The editor opens with the right tool selected. Make your changes in a couple of clicks.
Download the result
Save the finished PDF straight to your device. No account, no watermark, no wait.
Frequently asked questions
It depends on the content. On our 208-page, 93 MB reference document we measured −32.3% at the recommended preset and −97.8% at extreme; on a 26-page, 6.4 MB file, −62.9% and −73.5%. Text-only PDFs compress far less because they are already small.
Text is vector data and stays perfectly sharp. Compression re-encodes the embedded images, which is where the size savings come from.
No server limit, compression runs locally in your browser, so your device's memory is the only constraint.
Yes, scans are the best case: they are almost entirely images, so they shrink dramatically. Pair with OCR afterwards if you also need searchable text.