How to crop a PDF
- Add your PDF. The first page appears with a rectangle drawn over it.
- Drag the rectangle to move it, or drag any corner to resize. The measurement below the page updates as you go, in millimetres and points.
- Use the page menu to check the crop against other pages — a header on page one is not always in the same place on page ten.
- Choose whether the crop applies to every page or only some, then press Crop PDF.
About this tool
Cropping a PDF trims the visible area of each page, cutting away wide margins, a scanner's black border, or the header and footer of a document that was printed to PDF. This free PDF cropper lets you drag the area you want and applies it across the document.
It is worth understanding exactly what cropping does, because most tools are vague about it. A PDF page carries a CropBox: the region that readers display and printers print. Cropping sets that box. The content outside it is still present in the file and can be brought back by anyone who resets the box. That is true of every PDF cropper, including the ones built into paid software — it is how the format works, not a shortcut taken here.
The practical consequence: cropping is the right tool for tidying margins, fitting a page to a screen, or lifting a chart out of a report. It is the wrong tool for hiding something confidential. If content must genuinely be gone, crop first and then run the result through Flatten PDF with "Everything" selected, which redraws each page as an image and leaves nothing outside the visible area to recover.
Frequently asked questions
- Does cropping delete the content outside the box?
- No. It sets the visible area. The content outside remains in the file and can be recovered by resetting the crop box. To remove it for good, flatten the cropped file afterwards.
- Can I crop each page differently?
- Not in a single pass. One rectangle is applied to all the pages you choose. To crop a different region elsewhere, run the tool again on the result with a different page range.
- Will cropping make the file smaller?
- Barely. The hidden content is still stored. Running Compress PDF afterwards, or flattening, will reduce the size.
- Is my document uploaded to crop it?
- No. The page is rendered and the crop is written inside your browser. Nothing is transmitted.
- Why does my cropped PDF look uncropped in one app?
- A few older viewers ignore the CropBox and display the full MediaBox. Flattening the cropped file produces something every reader displays identically.