# PDF Text Extractor

> Pull all the text out of a PDF as plain text you can search, copy or reuse.

To extract text from a PDF, add the file and the text layer of every page is read with pdf.js and returned as plain text. If the PDF is a scan, the pages are images with no text layer, and the tool tells you that rather than returning an empty result.

**URL:** https://convertto.tech/t/pdf-text-extractor
**Category:** PDF Tools (https://convertto.tech/c/pdf-tools)
**Privacy:** Runs entirely in the browser; no upload
**Cost:** Free, no sign-up
**Last updated:** 2026-08-01

## Key facts

- **Privacy:** Runs entirely in your browser — nothing is uploaded
- **Cost:** Free, unlimited, no sign-up

## How to use

1. Select your pdf file — the file stays on your device and is never uploaded.
2. Choose the output.
3. Press Run, then download the result when it is ready.

## FAQ

### Why did it find no text in my PDF?

The document is almost certainly a scan or photograph. Those PDFs contain images with no underlying text layer, so extraction returns nothing. Reading them requires OCR, which is a different process.

## Related tools

- [OCR PDF](https://convertto.tech/t/ocr-pdf): Recognise the text in a scanned PDF and add it as an invisible, selectable layer over the original pages.
- [PDF to Text Extractor](https://convertto.tech/t/pdf-to-text): Extract the text of a PDF with paragraphs rebuilt and hyphenation repaired.
- [Split PDF](https://convertto.tech/t/split-pdf): Extract pages from a PDF or split it into separate files.
- [Edit PDF](https://convertto.tech/t/edit-pdf): Add text, pictures, shapes, arrows, highlights and freehand drawing to any PDF page.
- [Extract PDF Pages](https://convertto.tech/t/extract-pdf-pages): Pull specific pages out of a PDF into a new document, in one file or one file per page.
- [Text to PDF](https://convertto.tech/t/text-to-pdf): Turn plain text, notes or log output into a paginated PDF with page numbers.
- [Add Page Numbers to PDF](https://convertto.tech/t/add-page-numbers-pdf): Number the pages of a PDF with a custom start, position and format.
- [Compress PDF](https://convertto.tech/t/compress-pdf): Reduce PDF file size by re-rendering pages at a lower resolution and quality.