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PDF to Markdown

Turn a PDF into clean Markdown with its headings, lists, bold text, links and code blocks. Copy it or save a .md file. The PDF is read on your device, never uploaded.

Updated by Khokhar Sab

How do I convert a PDF to Markdown?

Press Choose PDF files and pick one or more PDFs. The Markdown appears in the box after the pages are read. Choose whether to drop repeated headers and mark page breaks, then press Copy text or Download .md. Several PDFs download as one ZIP with a .md file for each.

  1. Press Choose PDF files.
  2. Check the Markdown in the box.
  3. Set Remove repeated headers, footers and page numbers and Mark page breaks.
  4. Press Copy text, or Download .md.

What formatting does it keep?

Text larger than the body becomes a heading, with levels by size. Lines starting with bullets or numbers become lists. Monospace text becomes a code block. In our round-trip test, a PDF made from known Markdown came back with all 5 headings, 5 list items, 1 link, 1 code block and a price table with all 4 rows.

In the PDFIn the Markdown
Large title text# Heading, ## Heading by size
Bullets • and numbers 1.- item and 1. item
Bold and italic fonts**bold** and *italic*
Clickable links[text](https://…)
Monospace textFenced code block
Tables, ruled or lined up with spaces| a | b | table
Page ends--- (optional)

Why convert a PDF to Markdown for AI tools?

Markdown keeps a document's structure in plain text: headings show sections, lists stay lists, and there is no layout noise. Language models read it well, and it takes fewer characters than HTML. Converting first also means you paste only text, not the whole file, into a chatbot.

Does it convert tables and images?

Tables, yes. Ruled tables, tables between horizontal rules and tables lined up with spaces become Markdown tables, and text wrapped inside a cell stays in that cell. In our test, a bank statement with no lines came back as one clean table per page. Images are left out; use Extract Images to save them.

Limits and fixes

  • Scanned PDFs have no text to read; the tool says so. Run OCR PDF on them first, then convert.
  • Images are left out, and tables with merged cells may need tidying by hand.
  • Headings in the same size as body text, only bold, stay as bold paragraphs.
  • Multi-column layouts follow the order the PDF stores text in, usually column by column.

Frequently asked questions

Is it free?

Yes, with no sign-up, no page limit and no watermark.

Which Markdown does it write?

CommonMark, which GitHub, Obsidian, Notion imports and other Markdown editors read.

Can I edit the Markdown before saving?

Copy it into your editor. The box shows the result; changing the options updates it.

Can I turn Markdown back into a PDF?

Yes, with Markdown to PDF on this site.

Is my PDF uploaded?

No. PDF.js reads it in your browser, and the Markdown is written on your device.

How this tool was built and tested