Compress PDF.
Compress and reduce PDF file size instantly in your browser. Perfect for shrinking scanned documents and photo-heavy PDFs.
Select Compression Level
Suggested Workflows
How to use the Compress PDF
- Drag and drop your PDF into the upload area, or click to browse and select a file from your device.
- Choose a compression level — Low, Medium, or High — based on how much you need to shrink the file.
- Click "Compress PDF" and watch the progress bar as your file is processed locally in your browser.
- Compare the original and compressed file sizes shown on screen.
- Click "Download" to save your smaller PDF instantly to your device.
Frequently Asked Questions About Compress PDF
No. Every part of the compression process — reading the PDF, recompressing embedded images, and rebuilding the file — runs locally in your browser using JavaScript. Your document is never transmitted over the internet, unlike most free PDF compressors online.
No. Unlike tools that flatten entire pages into images, this compressor only recompresses the embedded photos and scanned images inside your PDF. All text, fonts, and vector graphics are left completely untouched, so your document stays sharp and fully selectable/searchable after compression.
Low keeps images close to their original quality with a modest size reduction — best when visual fidelity matters most. Medium (the recommended default) balances noticeable file-size savings with clear image quality, ideal for email attachments and everyday sharing. High applies more aggressive image compression for the smallest possible file, useful when you're up against a strict upload limit.
The tool doesn't target an exact byte count directly, but selecting the High compression level gets you closest to strict limits like the 100KB–500KB caps common on Indian exam, college admission, and job-portal upload forms. If your file is still above the limit afterward, it usually means the original scan was captured at very high resolution — re-scanning at a lower resolution before compressing can help you get under tight limits.
If your PDF is mostly text or vector content with few or no embedded images, there's very little image data to recompress, so the size reduction will be modest — that's a sign your file was already lean, not an error. PDFs that are mostly scanned photos or high-resolution images see the largest reductions.
Not directly. Encrypted PDFs need to be unlocked first, since the encryption prevents any client-side tool — including this one — from reading the file's internal structure. Remove the password using your PDF viewer, then upload the unlocked file here to compress it.
There's no artificial limit set by ToolFesto. Because everything runs in your browser, the only real constraint is your device's available memory — most phones and laptops handle typical scanned documents and multi-page reports without any issue.
Yes. The compressor is fully optimized for mobile browsers on iOS and Android, so you can shrink a scanned document or photo-based PDF straight from your phone before uploading it elsewhere.
Yes. There's no account, no watermark added to your download, and no cap on how many PDFs you can compress per day — ever.
Those tools work the same way for you as the user, but they process your file on their servers, meaning your document is uploaded to a remote system before you get it back. This compressor never leaves your device, which matters if you're compressing ID documents, financial records, or anything else you'd rather not send anywhere.
About Compress PDF
Shrink Large PDFs Without Losing Sharp Text
Scanned documents, certificates, and photo-heavy reports can quickly balloon into multi-megabyte PDF files that are too large to email, upload to a portal, or share over WhatsApp. Our free PDF compressor shrinks these files directly inside your browser by intelligently recompressing the embedded images inside your document — not by flattening every page into a single low-resolution picture like many competing tools. That means your text stays crisp, selectable, and searchable, while the overall file size drops dramatically.
How to Compress a PDF Online
- Upload Your File: Drag and drop your PDF into the upload area, or click to browse your device.
- Pick a Compression Level: Choose Low, Medium, or High depending on how aggressively you need to shrink the file.
- Compress Locally: Click "Compress PDF" and watch the progress bar as everything processes on your own device.
- Compare & Download: Check the before-and-after file size, then download your smaller PDF instantly.
100% Client-Side — Your Files Never Leave Your Device
Most free PDF compressors — including popular names like Smallpdf and iLovePDF — work by uploading your document to a remote server, compressing it there, and sending the result back down to you. That round-trip means your file, however briefly, sits on someone else's infrastructure. Our client-side PDF compressor skips that step entirely: the parsing, image recompression, and rebuilding of your PDF all happen locally in your browser using JavaScript. There's nothing to upload, nothing stored on a server, and the tool even works offline once the page has loaded — making it a safer choice for ID documents, financial statements, and anything else you'd rather keep private.
Understanding the Compression Levels
- Low (Best Quality): Applies gentle image recompression for a modest size reduction — ideal when visual fidelity matters most, such as design proofs or print-ready documents.
- Medium (Recommended): Balances a noticeably smaller file with clear, readable image quality — the right default for email attachments and everyday sharing.
- High (Smallest Size): Applies the most aggressive image compression to hit the smallest possible file size — useful when you're working against a strict upload limit.
Common Reasons to Compress a PDF
Reducing PDF file size is one of the most common everyday document tasks, especially for:
- Exam & Government Portals: Many Indian exam forms, college admission portals, and government e-filing systems cap PDF uploads at 100KB–1MB. Our High compression level is built for exactly this kind of strict limit.
- Email Attachments: Most inboxes cap attachments around 25MB — compressing large scanned documents keeps you comfortably under that limit.
- Job Applications: Portals like Naukri, LinkedIn, and company career pages often reject oversized resume or certificate PDFs.
- Faster Sharing: Smaller files upload and download faster over WhatsApp, cloud storage, and slower mobile connections.
Built for Scanned Documents and Photo-Heavy PDFs
PDFs created from phone scans, certificates, or ID proofs are usually large because of the embedded photo data, not the text itself. By targeting only that embedded image data — resizing and re-encoding it at your chosen quality level — our compressor delivers meaningful size reductions on exactly the files that need it most, while leaving any existing selectable text or vector graphics completely intact.
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