Compress PDF — Reduce PDF File Size Online
Compress PDFs in your browser.
PDFs from scanners, photo-heavy reports, or "save as PDF" exports are usually 5–10× larger than they need to be. Dropvert's PDF Optimizer flattens each page to a high-quality JPEG at the DPI and quality you pick, then rebuilds a smaller PDF — typically 60–90% smaller, no upload required.
How it works
3-step walkthrough
How it works
3-step walkthrough
- 1
Drop a PDF
Up to 200 MB. Dropvert checks the file is actually a PDF and shows the original size.
- 2
Pick a compression preset, or target a size
Light (~50% smaller), Medium (~70%, default), Heavy (~85%). Or set a target file size in MB and Dropvert iterates quality/DPI until it lands under the target.
- 3
Download the rebuilt PDF
See the before/after size comparison. The output is a flattened PDF with the same page count and visual fidelity as the original at the picked quality.
Why use Dropvert
Local-first, free, no upload required
Why use Dropvert
Local-first, free, no upload required
- Three presets covering most needs: Light, Medium, Heavy.
- Target-size mode: "make this PDF under 5 MB" and Dropvert binary-searches the right quality.
- Custom mode: pick DPI and quality manually if you want fine control.
- Flatten-based — works on any PDF, including scans, image-heavy reports, and PDFs with weird font subsetting.
- Runs locally; the PDF never leaves your device.
Frequently asked questions
6 answered
Frequently asked questions
6 answered
- How much can I shrink my PDF?
- Photo-heavy PDFs (scans, photo books, magazine exports): 70–90% smaller. Text-heavy PDFs: 30–60%. Already-optimized PDFs from professional tools: 10–30%, sometimes nothing. The Optimizer can't make a small PDF smaller than its essential content.
- Will the text still be selectable after compression?
- No. The flatten approach rasterizes each page to an image, then rebuilds the PDF — selectable text becomes pixels. If you need text selection preserved, use a PDF tool that does selective image-XObject replacement (Adobe Acrobat's Reduce File Size) instead. Trade-off: this approach works on every PDF, including ones that defeat selective compression.
- What's the difference between Light, Medium, and Heavy?
- Light keeps DPI at 200 and quality at 80% — visible only on close inspection. Medium drops to 150 DPI and 65% — fine for most viewing. Heavy is 100 DPI and 50% — visibly soft on text but okay for archive-only PDFs. Default to Medium unless you have a specific reason.
- How does target-size mode work?
- You set a target (e.g., 2 MB). Dropvert starts at Medium settings, measures the output, and iteratively adjusts DPI and quality down until the result fits, or up if it could be higher quality. Reports whether it reached the target.
- Can I optimize a password-protected PDF?
- Not currently — remove the password first. Dropvert's loader rejects encrypted PDFs to avoid surprises around what gets re-encoded.
- Does optimization strip metadata?
- It rebuilds the PDF, which drops most metadata (author, title, creation tool). If you need to preserve metadata, run optimization first then re-attach via a PDF metadata editor; or use Metadata Eraser as the explicit metadata-stripping pass.
Related tools
5 suggestions
Related tools
5 suggestions