PDF files are very useful for sharing information. It is a format that has managed to impose itself even if it has some flaws. One of the flaws is that the weight of PDF files can quickly make several megabytes. And when you want to share via email, this is often a problem because inboxes often limit the size of attachments.
And so to solve this problem, you have to compress.
How do I lighten a PDF?
There are different solutions to reduce the size of a PDF file:
- compress the file online
- compress the file locally on his computer
- cut the file into several parts
Compression and separation of an online PDF
Compression and online division for a PDF file has the advantage of being simple, fast and on most sites, free.
One drawback, but big, is confidentiality … Your file, even if it is not accessible to other visitors to the site, we do not know what the site does … And it can be dangerous.
If you would like to do transactions on a PDF file that you would like it to remain confidential, I invite you to read below.
Note: Your file, when you send it to the site, is a copy that is sent. You still have your original file in your computer, in the same place.
A non-exhaustive list of sites that allow compression and division of an online PDF:
- SmallPDF (compress – divide)
- ILovePdf (compress – divide)
- PDF 24 (compress – divide)
- SodaPdf (compress – divide)
These sites can reduce the weight of your file, but also make other changes if necessary.
Compress a PDF on your computer
Despite the fact that there are many sites that do this for free and easily, there is little software that does it for free. In reality, they are rare. Even rarer are the ones who do that.
Unless I'm mistaken, Adobe Reader and Foxit Reader, 2 well-known PDF viewers, don't do it natively.
I still managed to find a small pearl: the software is available on Windows, it is very light, it only does that and it does it well. It's in English.
He still managed to reduce me a file from 300MB to 8MB!
What's his name? Free PDF Compresor
Separate a PDF into multiple files
Again, there are few free choices available to you.
There is still a software that does its job well and is open source. It allows:
- Merge
- Cut
- extract one or more pages
- turn/rotate pages
- assemble alternately
- bookmark cutting
- separate the file into different sizes
What's his name? PDFSam (take the Basic version that includes the above mentioned features and be free)