How to copy text from a PDF
For a line or two, select it in your PDF reader and copy. For the whole document, open Extract text, add the PDF and press Extract the text: you get a plain .txt file of every word, page by page, ready to copy from.
Extract textFree. Nothing is uploaded.
How to do it
- Open Extract text and add the PDF, or several.
- If a file is locked, type its password in the box under it and tap Unlock.
- Press Extract the text.
- Save the .txt file, or open it, select what you need and copy.
Selecting in a reader, or extracting
Most readers let you select words and copy them: drag across with a mouse, or on a phone, press and hold a word and drag the handles. That is fine for a sentence. It is slow for a long document, fiddly across page breaks, and some phone viewers do not let you select at all. Extract text takes every word at once and gives you a plain text file that opens in any notes app, email or word processor.
What the text file looks like
The words come in reading order, with a line such as --- Page 3 --- where each page starts, so a quote can be traced back to its page. Bold, sizes, columns and tables are not kept: it is the words alone, which is what you want for pasting into an email, a message or a search. Every PDF you add gets its own .txt, named after it, and the result line counts the words and pages.
Why a scan gives no text
A scanned page, or a photo saved as a PDF, holds a picture of the words rather than the words themselves, so there is nothing to copy. Extract text says so instead of saving an empty file, and in a mixed file it names the pages that are only pictures. Run the file through Make searchable first: it reads the words in English, Malayalam, Hindi and eighteen more languages, on your device, and puts them into the PDF. Then extract the text from the searchable copy.
When the copied text is garbled
Sometimes a PDF that clearly has text copies out as nonsense: letters swapped for symbols, Hindi or Malayalam turned into English letters, words run together. That is in the file, not the tool: it was made with fonts that do not say which letter each shape stands for, as older Indian-language typing fonts do not. Copying from any reader gives the same result. For pages like that, treat them as a scan; Hindi OCR for scanned PDFs shows the steps, and they work for any language.
Keeping tables and layout
If you want the structure as well as the words, convert to a format that keeps it. PDF to Word gives headings, paragraphs, lists and tables you can edit. PDF to Excel turns tables, such as a bank statement, into rows and columns with amounts as numbers. Plain text is best when you only need the words.
A worked example
Asha needs to quote three clauses from a 40-page insurance policy in an email to her insurer, from her phone, and selecting across page breaks in her phone’s viewer keeps losing the selection. She opens Extract text, adds the PDF and presses Extract the text. She opens the .txt in a text app, finds the clause numbers with its search, copies the three clauses and pastes them into the email, each with its page number from the page markers.
Questions people ask
Is my PDF uploaded to get the text?
No. The words are read out of the file in your browser, on your device, and the file never leaves it.
Can I copy text from a locked PDF?
Yes, if you know its password: type it when the file asks.
The PDF opens but will not let me copy. Why?
Whoever made it switched on a restriction. See print or copy from a PDF that will not let you.
Does it work with Malayalam and Hindi text?
Yes, where the PDF holds real text in those scripts. Older files made with non-standard fonts copy out garbled; that is in the file itself.
Can I get the text from several PDFs at once?
Yes. Add them all; each gives its own .txt, and Save all saves them together.
Does it work offline?
Yes, once the page has loaded: nothing it does needs the internet.
Your file stays on your device. Foolscap does the work inside your browser, so nothing is uploaded and there is nothing for anyone to keep. How you can check