PDF to Word

Be clear about what you get

This tool extracts the text and rebuilds it as a Word document. Paragraphs, line order and page breaks survive, and lines set in noticeably larger type are turned into headings so the document keeps its structure. Images, tables and the original page layout do not come across.

That makes it the right tool when you want the words — a report you need to quote from, a CV to update, a letter to reuse, a document whose text you need to search and edit. It is the wrong tool when the layout is the point, like a designed brochure or a form with fields. For those, a server-based converter that rebuilds the layout will serve you better, and it is worth saying so rather than having you find out after the download.

Scanned PDFs will not work

If your PDF came from a scanner or a phone camera, the pages are pictures of text rather than text, and there is nothing for the converter to extract. The tool detects this and tells you instead of handing back an empty document. Converting a scan needs OCR, which this tool does not do. A quick way to check first: open the PDF and try to select a sentence with your cursor. If the text highlights, this will work. If nothing highlights, it is a scan.

Options worth using

You can convert every page or give a custom range like 1-5, 8, 11-13, which is the fast way to pull one chapter out of a long report. Body text size can be set to 10, 11, 12 or 14pt — 11pt is the default and matches most Word documents, so the result does not look out of place when you paste it alongside existing text.

Related tools

Word to PDF converts in the opposite direction when you need to send a finished document. If you only want the raw words rather than a Word file, Extract Text from PDF pulls plain text straight out of the PDF, and Compress PDF reduces the PDF's size if that was the real problem.