How to use PDF to Text
- Drop one PDF file on the page. The text is extracted right away.
- Optionally enter the pages you want (for example 1-3, 5), choose “Plain text (.txt)” or “Markdown (.md)”, and turn “Mark where each page starts” on or off.
- If some pages have no text (scans or pictures), tick their languages and click “Read page(s) with OCR”.
- Copy the text or click “Download”.
Supported formats
Input: one PDF file. Output: the text shown on the page, ready to copy, or downloaded as a .txt or .md file with the same name as the PDF.
Limits
Text comes out in the order it is stored in the file, so tables, columns and footnotes may be rearranged, and formatting is not kept. A PDF that needs a password to open must be unlocked first; OCR results should be checked, especially numbers and names.
Privacy
Everything runs in your browser: your files are never uploaded to a server, and there is no sign-up.
Frequently asked questions
Can it extract text from a scanned PDF?
Yes. Pages without text are listed, and “Read page(s) with OCR” recognises the text in them. OCR supports Vietnamese, English, Simplified and Traditional Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Hindi and Russian.
Does it keep tables and formatting?
No. The result is plain text or simple Markdown with optional page headings. Tables and multi-column layouts may come out in a different order than you read them.
Can I extract text from only some pages?
Yes. Type page ranges such as 1-3, 5, 8- in the “Pages” field; leave it empty for all pages.
Is my PDF uploaded for OCR?
No. Both text extraction and OCR run in your browser. The first time you use OCR, the language data is downloaded from MiniTools and then cached; your file never leaves your device.