Image to PDF

How to use Image to PDF

1. Select your images, in the order you want the pages.
2. Set the page size and orientation.
3. Generate and download the PDF.
4. Text in the resulting PDF is not selectable or searchable — it is a picture.
5. Large photographs make large PDFs; resize before combining if the file has to be emailed.
6. Everything runs in your browser, so identity documents and statements are not uploaded.

Page size and orientation

Each image is placed on a page sized to fit it, or scaled to a standard page, depending on the option you choose. Mixing portrait and landscape photographs into a fixed page size leaves large margins on one or the other — usually acceptable for a document that will be read on screen, and worth thinking about if it will be printed. For a document that must look like a scan, use a consistent orientation and A4 or Letter throughout.

The output is a picture of a document, not a document

The resulting PDF contains images, so its text is not selectable, not searchable, and not copyable. Anyone receiving it cannot find a phrase in it, and automated systems cannot read it. If the recipient needs to extract the content, either send the original file or run the PDF through OCR afterwards. Many institutions specifically require searchable PDFs, and a photograph of a page will be rejected.

Photographing documents well

Flat, evenly lit and square-on. Shadows from your own hands are the usual problem, so light from the side rather than overhead. Fill the frame with the page, which both improves resolution and avoids the desk. Most phones have a document scanning mode that deskews and flattens the perspective, and its output is markedly better than a plain photograph — worth using before bringing the images here.

File size

Phone photographs are large: ten pages can easily exceed 40 MB, which many email systems and upload forms reject. Scale the images down before combining — a page of text is perfectly legible at around 1,500 pixels on the long edge, which is a fraction of what a modern phone camera produces. Doing it before the PDF is built is far more effective than trying to compress it afterwards.