Turning PDF pages into pictures
Making pictures of a PDF's pages is how you get a page into something that cannot open a PDF: a chat window, a slide, a listing, a printer that wants an image. The one choice that matters is the resolution, and the one thing to be sure about is that the page stops being a document the moment it becomes a picture.
Which tool you need
A page to drop into a message, a post or a slide
PDF to JPG at 150 DPI. It is sharp on any screen and the files stay small enough to send without thinking about it.
A page that will be printed
300 DPI. It is print quality and the files are much larger, which only matters if you are sending them rather than printing them.
A page that is mostly text, a diagram or a screenshot
PDF to PNG instead. JPG compression softens sharp edges, and lettering and thin lines are all sharp edges.
The recipient needs to search or copy the words
Send the PDF, or a few pages of it. Extract PDF pages gives you a small document that is still a document.
You want the photographs that are inside the PDF
That is a different job and not one this tool does. Every page is drawn afresh at the resolution you choose, so what you get is a picture of the whole page rather than the pictures on it.
Choosing the number
There are three presets and a box to type your own. The lowest draws the page at roughly the size it would be on a screen and makes the smallest files; the middle one is what most people want, sharp on any display without being heavy; the highest is what a printer needs, and the files are large enough that you notice.
The rule of thumb is to pick for where the picture ends up, not for how it looks now. A 300 DPI page looks identical to a 150 DPI page on screen and is roughly four times the size, so sending it is four times the wait for no visible gain. Print is the one place the difference shows.
One file or a folder of them
Convert one page and a single picture lands on your device. Convert several and they arrive together in one ZIP, a file per page, each named after your PDF and numbered so that a folder puts them back in reading order.
So if you only want page four, select page four rather than converting everything and hunting through a ZIP for it.
What the picture is not
A JPG is a picture of the page. Its text cannot be selected or searched, its links do nothing, and its form fields are gone — they are drawn rather than kept.
That is the trade, and it is worth making on purpose. Keep the original PDF for anyone who has to read or work with it, and send the picture to whoever just needs to see it.
What to know before you start
- Pages are drawn, not unpacked. The photographs stored inside the PDF are not extracted as their own files.
- A password-protected PDF cannot be drawn. Take the password off with Unlock PDF first.
- Every page is drawn in your browser and saved on this device, so nothing goes anywhere unless you choose Share.