PDF to text
The contents of your PDF, as reusable plain text.
Your files never leave your deviceDrop your PDF here
The text is extracted automatically as soon as you drop the file
How to extract text from a PDF, step by step
The tool pulls out the text actually present in the file, page by page, so you can read it or reuse it elsewhere. Nothing leaves your browser.
Drop in the PDF
Drag the file onto the drop area, or click to browse your files. Extraction starts immediately, with no button to click.
Let VellumPDF go through every page
Each page’s text is pulled out and linked to the next with a “———— Page n ————” marker, in the order it appears in the file.
Read the result shown on screen
The full text appears in a scrolling box, with the character and word count just above it.
Download or copy the text
“Download .txt” saves a text file named after the original PDF; “Copy” places the result on the clipboard to paste elsewhere.
A password-protected PDF is refused right away, with a dedicated message: remove the protection first with the unlock tool, then come back here.
Frequently asked questions
What does the text extracted from a PDF look like?
The text is returned as a .txt file, organized page by page, ready to reuse in a word processor or any other tool. It is the text actually present in the file that gets pulled out, with no formatting.
Does the tool work on a scanned PDF?
No, extraction relies solely on text already present in the PDF file, not on image recognition. If the document is a scan with no underlying text, nothing will come out: run it through VellumPDF’s OCR tool first.
Is this service free, and is the document sent online?
Yes, the tool is free with no usage limit. Extraction runs entirely in your browser, without sending the PDF to a server.
Does the extracted text keep the layout?
No, and that is the nature of the format: you get the text, not the layout. Columns unroll one after the other, tables lose their grid. If structure matters, the Markdown export at least keeps the headings; if layout matters, the Word export is the one you want.
In what order does text come out of a two-column page?
In the order it is declared in the file, which usually follows natural reading but not always. On a brochure or a newspaper, a sidebar sometimes slips into the middle of a paragraph. A quick read-through is enough to spot it.
Why does extraction return nothing on some files?
Because the document has no text layer: it is a page image, typically a scan or a photo. There is then literally nothing to extract. Run the file through text recognition first, which adds that layer, then extract again.