What compresses well — and what doesn't
This tool shines on scanned or image-based PDFs: certificates, ID scans, filled forms, anything that's essentially photographs of pages. Those are exactly the documents behind most "compress PDF to X KB" searches, and they shrink dramatically with no meaningful loss of legibility. Text-heavy or vector PDFs (exported from Word, generated reports) shrink less, and their text can become non-selectable since pages are rebuilt as images — the tool tells you honestly when a document can't reach the target without that trade-off.
Getting the smallest readable file
Scan in grayscale rather than colour where the document allows (roughly a third the size), keep source scans at 150–200 DPI, and remove pages the form doesn't require before compressing — fewer pages means more quality budget for the ones that matter.
Frequently asked questions
How do I compress a PDF to an exact KB size?
Choose your PDF, enter the target size in KB, and the tool re-renders and rebuilds the file to land at or under that limit. Common targets have dedicated pages (100KB, 200KB, 500KB).
Is my document uploaded to a server?
No. The entire process runs in your browser. Your PDF never leaves your device — it works even offline after the page has loaded once.
Why doesn't my text PDF get much smaller?
Text and vector PDFs are already efficient, so there's little image data to compress. This tool is optimised for scanned/image PDFs, which is where the big size savings are.