PDF to TXT Converter

Convert PDF to TXT online for free. Fast, private, no signup, no watermark, high-quality PDF-to-TXT conversion.

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PDF to TXT - Strip formatting - feed the raw text into a workflow

Everything except the words goes: formatting, images, layout. That is the point when the destination is a script rather than a reader, an LLM prompt, a search indexer, a corpus you are analysing, or when a system has asked for plain text and means it. One catch: a scanned PDF holds pictures of words rather than words, so without OCR first the output comes back empty.

PDF to TXT: whether there is text at all

A PDF stores glyphs positioned on a page, not sentences, so extraction reconstructs reading order from coordinates, which is why multi-column layouts can come out interleaved. The bigger divide is whether the PDF has a text layer at all: a scanned document is images of words, and extraction returns nothing until OCR has been run.

Convert to search, quote or process the contents of a document. An empty result is the signature of a scan rather than a failure of the conversion.

PDF vs TXT: Side-by-side

Technical comparison of the two formats, useful for deciding which to use, or for confirming what changes during conversion.

Property	PDF	TXT
Full name	Portable Document Format	Plain Text
Year introduced	1993	1963
Developer / standard body	Adobe	ANSI / IBM
MIME type	application/pdf	text/plain
File extension	.pdf	.txt
Compression	Built-in (FlateDecode, DCTDecode)	None
Color / data depth	Vector + raster	N/A
Max dimensions / size	381 km × 381 km (15,000 × 15,000 inches)	Unlimited
Transparency	Yes	No
Animation	No	No
Standard / specification	ISO 32000	ASCII / Unicode
Best for	Final-form documents, contracts, archives, looks identical everywhere	Code, raw data, universal compatibility

Frequently asked questions

How to convert PDF to editable TXT without losing formatting

Upload the PDF and choose an output format. Text, headings, tables, and images are reconstructed into an editable TXT you can open in Word, Google Docs, or LibreOffice. Simple layouts convert nearly perfectly; complex multi-column designs may need minor touch-ups.

Can I convert a scanned PDF to an editable TXT?

If your PDF contains selectable text (not just a photo of a page), the converter extracts it into editable TXT. For image-only scanned PDFs, run iFormat's OCR tool first to extract the text, then convert the result.

How to convert PDF to TXT without Microsoft Office

PDF converts to TXT entirely online, no Word, Office, or any desktop software needed. The resulting TXT opens in Google Docs, LibreOffice, or any editor that handles the format.

Can I edit the text after converting PDF to TXT?

Yes. That's the point. TXT is plain text with no formatting, so once converted you can revise wording, fix typos, and restyle content that was locked inside the PDF.

Why convert PDF to TXT?

A PDF is fixed-layout and hard to change. Converting to TXT unlocks the content for universal, lightweight text, editing a contract clause, updating a report, or reusing text elsewhere.

What is PDF?

PDF is a fixed-layout document format, typically used for sharing and printing with locked formatting. Converting it to TXT produces a file that opens on systems without PDF support.