About Crop PDF
Cropping a PDF means telling a page to show less than it holds. A scanned page with a thick grey border, a slide with a wide empty margin, an invoice where only the middle matters: in each case the content is fine and the frame around it is the problem.
This tool trims a set amount off the top, bottom, left and right of your pages. You choose how much, and which pages, and the pages come back with a tighter frame. It runs in your browser, so the document is not uploaded.
How to crop a PDF
- Choose the PDF.
- Enter how much to trim off each edge in the Top, Bottom, Left and Right boxes. The unit is the point, and there are 72 of them to the inch, so 36 is half an inch and about 1.3 centimetres. A box left empty trims nothing.
- If only some pages need cropping, write them in the Pages box, such as "2-5". Left empty, every page is cropped.
- Press the button. The result reports how many pages were cropped, and how many were left alone because they were too small to trim by that much.
- Check the preview for any page where the content now touches the edge, then save.
When you would use it
- Removing the black border a scanner leaves around a page.
- Cutting the wide margins off a slide deck exported to PDF so it reads better on a phone.
- Trimming a header and footer you do not want to share from a copied page.
- Making a page fit a standard frame for printing or presentation.
- Tightening a document before an e-reader displays it, so the text appears larger.
What it will not do
- Cropping hides the margin rather than deleting what is on it. The trimmed area is still inside the file, and a determined person can recover it. To remove something so that it is really gone, use Redact.
- The same trim applies to every page you select. There is no per-page or draw-a-box mode, so a document whose pages need different crops has to be done in several runs, one page range at a time.
- The amounts are numbers, not a drag handle on a picture. Try a figure, look at the preview and adjust.
- A page that is too small to lose the amount you asked for is left alone, and the tool says so.
- It does not resize the page to a paper size. To lay photos on A4 or Letter, use JPG to PDF.
How it compares
Scanner software and image editors can crop the picture before it becomes a PDF, which is the best result when you still have the scan. When all you have is the finished PDF, trimming the page frame is the quickest way to the same appearance.
Because the content is hidden and not removed, cropping is the wrong tool for confidentiality and the right one for appearance. The distinction is the one thing worth remembering about it.
Tips
- Start with a small amount, such as 18 points, and increase it. It is easier to trim a bit more than to see what a heavy crop cut off.
- The top and bottom boxes trim equal amounts on every selected page. If a scan sits slightly off centre, trim the smaller side less.