How to Extract Text from PDF Online Free
Need to copy text from a PDF that doesn't allow selection? Or extract all the text from a large report into a plain text file? PDF Boss extracts the full text content of any standard PDF — free, no account needed.
How to Extract Text from a PDF in 3 Steps
Step 1 — Go to pdfboss.in/pdf-to-text
Step 2 — Upload your PDF file
Step 3 — View the extracted text and copy it or download as a .txt file
The extraction happens instantly even for large documents.
When Text Extraction Is Useful
- Research — Copy quotes from academic PDFs into your notes or essay
- Data processing — Extract structured data from PDF reports into a spreadsheet
- Accessibility — Get plain text versions of documents to use with screen readers
- Editing — Extract the text from a PDF to recreate or edit the content in Word
- Search — Find specific phrases in a scanned report by converting to searchable text first
Standard PDFs vs Scanned PDFs
Standard PDFs (created from Word, Excel, or web browsers) contain actual text data that can be extracted directly. This tool works perfectly for them.
Scanned PDFs (created by scanning paper documents) contain only images. No text data is stored inside. For these, use the AI OCR tool which reads and recognises text from the images using artificial intelligence.
Try PDF to Text Free →Frequently Asked Questions
Can I extract text from a scanned PDF?
For scanned PDFs (image-based), use the OCR PDF tool which uses AI to recognise and extract text from images.
Does it preserve formatting like tables and columns?
Basic formatting such as line breaks is preserved. Complex layouts like multi-column text may appear as plain text.
Can I extract text from a password-protected PDF?
Only if you know the password. You will need to enter the password first to unlock the file.