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Compress a PDF to 5MB

5 MB is a limit for whole documents rather than single certificates: a signed agreement, a project report, a bundle of statements. Our one-page test scan alone started at 3.2 MB, so two pages straight off a scanner can already be over. Compress can open with 5 MB chosen, keep the pictures as sharp as that size allows, and measure the result before you download it. It runs in your browser, and a scan long enough will not fit even at its lowest step.

Updated

Compress a PDF to 5 MB

What usually gets under 5 MB

  • A color scan of up to about a dozen pages at the Recommended setting. Each page of our test scans came to about 360 KB there, so thirteen of them stay under 5 MB.
  • A longer scan at a lower setting. At the lowest step a page of our test scans was a little over 80 KB, so even a scan of several dozen pages can get there, with softer pictures.
  • A document that mixes text and pictures: ours got under 1 MB easily, far inside this limit.

What may still be over 5 MB

  • A color scan of 62 pages or more, which will not fit: each of our test pages was still a little over 80 KB at the lowest step.
  • A long document whose size is mostly embedded fonts, which Compress leaves alone.
  • A scan whose pages are stored in a lossless format, which Compress keeps at full size.
  • A password-protected PDF, which Compress does not open.

More on this: Why PDF files get large.

If your PDF stays over 5 MB

Split it into volumes

Where the form or the recipient accepts more than one file, Split PDF divides a long document into parts by page range, each of which can then be compressed to 5 MB on its own.

Open Split PDF

Remove the pages the reader does not need

Appendices, blank separator sheets and repeated pages add up quickly in a long scan. Delete PDF Pages takes them out before you compress.

Open Delete PDF Pages

Rescan a long document in gray

A multi-page text document rarely needs color. Scanned in grayscale, it starts smaller, and Compress has less to take away.

Forms that ask for 5 MB

There is no table on this page yet, because we list a 5 MB limit only after reading it on the publisher's own site and dating it, which has not been done. Check what your form or portal states.

A different size

Aiming for a different size? Each of these has its own page.

If you have no set size to hit, open Compress PDF without a target and choose from the sizes it offers for your file.

If the form asks you to resize the PDF, it means the file size: Resize PDF does the same job under that name and leaves every page its own size.

Compress runs in your browser. Your PDF is not uploaded, there is no account, and no watermark is added to the smaller copy.