Formatomat
FRENIT

Convert PDF to TXT

Turn your PDF documents into text files in seconds. Conversion happens in your browser, so your files are never uploaded to a server.

  • Files never uploaded
  • Free, no sign-up
  • No queue

or drop them here. You can also paste an image (Ctrl+V).

Free · No sign-up · No upload

How to convert PDF to TXT

  1. 01

    Add your PDF files

    Click “Choose PDF files” or drop them on the page. You can add several at once.

  2. 02

    Check the TXT format

    TXT is already selected. The text will be extracted line by line, without formatting.

  3. 03

    Convert and download

    Click “Convert”, then download your TXT file. With several files, grab everything at once as a ZIP.

PDF to TXT: what to know

Pulling the plain text out of a PDF is handy for feeding it to a translator, a word counter, an analysis tool or an AI assistant, for quoting it, or for archiving a contract in a form any device can read. Each line of the PDF becomes a line in the file, pages are separated by a page-break (form feed) character on a line of its own, and the text is saved as UTF-8, which preserves accents and special characters.

Because lines are kept as they are, a word hyphenated at the end of a line stays split, and paragraphs are broken at the width of the original page. Table cells are separated by a tab, and text set in two or more columns is read one column at a time. Boxed text and more complex layouts can still come out in a surprising order.

PDF vs TXT: what’s the difference?

PDFPortable Document Format

A document format created by Adobe in 1993 and now an ISO standard. The layout looks the same on every device, which makes it the reference format for sharing, signing and printing.

TXTPlain text

Plain text with no formatting. It opens in any editor and remains the simplest, most durable way to store text.

PDF to TXT: frequently asked questions

How do I get whole paragraphs instead of broken lines?

Convert the PDF to Markdown (.md) instead, which is a text file too: there, the lines of each paragraph are joined, words hyphenated at line ends are put back together, and a sentence split by a page break is usually reunited. Only a few formatting marks appear, such as # before headings. Converting to Word joins the lines as well, but each page of the PDF starts a new page there.

Can I extract the text from a scanned PDF?

Only if the scan already holds a layer of recognised text (OCR), added by the scanner or by software: that text is then extracted, and a message points out that it has not been checked. Otherwise a scan only holds a picture of each page, and Formatomat does not do character recognition. If only some pages are scanned, the text of the others is extracted and a message lists the missing pages. For a scan, convert the PDF to PNG, then run the images through an OCR tool, such as the copy-text-from-photos feature built into many phones.

Are my PDF files uploaded to the internet?

No. The file is read and converted by your browser, on your device. Nothing is sent to a server, and nothing is kept after you close the page.

Does converting PDF to TXT reduce quality?

TXT keeps only the text, line by line, with no formatting: that is what the format is. Page numbers that run in sequence from page to page are removed, headers and footers that are identical on every page are kept only once, and pictures, scans and drawings are left out, which the conversion points out. A check then compares the words carried over with those of the PDF (not the pictures nor the layout): if it finds a passage missing, a message quotes it.

How many PDF files can I convert?

As many as you like, for free and without signing up. Add them all, then download the results one by one or in a single ZIP. The maximum size depends on your device and browser, with a few caps that protect its memory (for example 20,000 files per archive or 5 million filled cells per workbook: see the home page FAQ); a file over one of them is not converted, and a message says so.

Does it work on iPhone and Android?

Formatomat is designed for recent browsers on computers, iPhone and Android, with no app to install. A conversion the browser cannot do (a format it cannot read or write) is refused with a message that says so.