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Tips, tutorials, and guides for working with PDF documents
These PDF tutorials show how to finish everyday tasks with ProPDF's 21 free tools: change the text of a document, combine several files, shrink a PDF for email, sign without printing, convert a PDF to Word and remove a password you know. One guide compares free PDF editors, and another explains which tools run in your browser and which use our server.
All the tools are free, with no account and no subscription, and every guide is available in 6 languages: English, French, Spanish, German, Portuguese and Russian.
How to Edit a PDF Online for Free (No Software Needed)
Change the text already in a PDF, replace a word on every page, and add check marks or a signature, for free and with no account. Steps and limits.
How to Merge PDF Files Into One Document
Combine several PDF files into one document for free: add them, set their order by drag and drop and download a single PDF, all in your browser.
How to Compress a PDF to Reduce File Size for Email
Make a PDF small enough to email: pick one of three compression levels, compare the size before and after, and see what makes a file heavy.
How to Sign a PDF Online Without Printing
Sign a PDF without printing or scanning it: draw, type or import your signature, place it on any page, and know when a certified signature is needed.
Free PDF Editors in 2026: How to Choose the Right One
How free PDF editors differ in 2026: what each kind of tool can change, what to check before you upload a file, and what ProPDF does and does not do.
How to Convert PDF to Word (and Keep Formatting)
Turn a digital PDF into an editable Word file laid out close to the original, understand what a converter has to rebuild, and know what to check.
Client-Side PDF Processing: Where Your Files Go
Which ProPDF tools process your file in your browser, which send it to our server in Paris, what the site records, and how to check it yourself.
How to Remove a Password From a PDF (When You Know It)
Remove the password from a PDF you can open, for free and with no account. Where to look if the password is missing, and when to keep it.
How to pick the right guide
Start from the task in front of you and open the guide that matches it. The how-to guides take you from opening your file to downloading the result.
If you are still choosing a tool, the comparison of free PDF editors helps you weigh features and limits before you start. If your document is confidential, read the privacy guide first: it explains which tools keep the file on your device and which send it over HTTPS to our server in Paris.
What the how-to guides cover
The how-to guides focus on the practical side of each task:
- The steps, with the button names you see on screen.
- The options that change the result, when the tool has any.
- The limits to know before you start, such as 4 MB for server tools, no OCR for scanned pages and visual signatures only.
Before you start
Check whether your PDF has selectable text: try to select a word in your PDF reader. A PDF exported from a word processor or another app usually has it. A scan is a picture of each page and has none, unless another program added a text layer; since ProPDF has no OCR, such a page cannot be edited or converted as text.
Tools that produce a file download it as a new one and leave your original untouched, so you can always start again from it. Keep the original until you have opened the result and checked it.