Compress PDF
Reduce file size while keeping good quality.
Free · No account needed · Your file is never stored
Files are processed in memory and never stored on our servers.
Your document
Compressing your PDF
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How it works
Upload
Drop in your file — nothing is stored on our servers.
We process it
Reduce file size while keeping good quality.
Download and analyze
Take the result, then find out what the document actually commits you to.
Why use LegalValidate for compress pdf
Three quality levels
High barely touches the images; medium is the sensible default; low is for when the mail server is the constraint, not the reader.
Aim at a size
Give it a target in megabytes and it works towards that rather than guessing what you meant.
Grayscale when colour is not the point
A scanned contract in grayscale is dramatically smaller and just as readable.
Says when it cannot help
If the file is already as small as it can be, it tells you rather than handing back a byte-identical "compressed" copy.
When you need this
- The mail server refuses attachments over 10 MB and the contract is 14.
- A filing portal caps uploads at 5 MB.
- A scanned agreement at 600 DPI is far larger than it needs to be.
- You are archiving hundreds of contracts and the storage bill is real.
What this tool will not do
- Most of the size in a scanned PDF is the page images, so that is what shrinks. A text-only contract is already small and will barely change.
- Compression is lossy on images: at the low setting, small print in a scan can soften. Check the result before sending something that has to be read in court.
- It cannot compress a file that is large because it has 800 pages — split it instead.
Compress PDF — questions
How much smaller will my file get? +
Scanned documents commonly drop by 60–90%. A text-only PDF may not shrink at all, and the tool says so rather than pretending.
Will the text stay readable? +
Yes at high and medium. The low setting is aggressive and is meant for cases where getting under a limit matters more than fine detail.
Does compressing lose the text layer? +
No. Text stays text and stays searchable; it is the images that are re-encoded.
Is the document a contract?
The same file can be read against six criteria — clarity, risk protection, enforceability, balance of terms, structure and overall exposure — free and without an account.
Need to do more than one thing to this document?
Open it in the document workspace instead: upload once, then reorder, rotate, delete, merge and compress without sending the file again.
Open the document workspace