Image to PDF

Making a PDF, step by step

1. Add your images. Drop them on the box or click the box to pick files. You can pick several at once, and you can add more later. New images go to the end of the list. You can add the same file again if you need it twice.
2. Put them in order. Each image becomes one page, from top to bottom, and shows its position number. Press ↑ to move an image one place up, or ↓ to move it one place down. Click ✕ to remove an image.
3. Click Convert to PDF. The images are prepared one at a time, and the PDF is built in your browser. The file is named after the first image, for example holiday.pdf, or holiday-and-4-more.pdf for five images.

Tip for page order: When you pick several files at once, the first order comes from your device. It is often by file name, but not always. Check the numbers in the list before you convert, and use the arrows to fix the order. For example, if the cover page is number 3 and should come first, press ↑ twice.

Which images work

The tool opens each image with your browser, draws it again and saves it for the PDF. So it works with every image type your browser can show.

If an image is skipped, save it as JPG or PNG first and add the new file. On an iPhone, you can set Settings > Camera > Formats to Most Compatible so that new photos are saved as JPG.

Page size: one pixel becomes one point

There are no settings for page size, margins or orientation. Each page is made exactly the size of its image. The tool counts one image pixel as one PDF point, and a point is 1/72 of an inch. So a large photo makes a very large page:

The large page size does not lower the quality. Every pixel of the image is kept. On screen, PDF viewers zoom the page to fit the window, so it looks normal. When you print, choose "Fit" or "Shrink to page" in the print dialog, and the page is scaled to your paper.

A few things follow from this:

• If your images have different sizes, the pages have different sizes too. A landscape photo makes a landscape page, and a portrait photo makes a portrait page.
• Resizing an image to 595 × 842 pixels does give a true A4 page. But that is only 72 pixels per inch, which looks soft when printed.
• If you need real A4 or Letter pages with margins, print the images to PDF from your computer instead. On Windows, choose "Microsoft Print to PDF" as the printer. On a Mac, use the PDF button in the print dialog.
• Very wide panoramas can be a problem. Adobe Acrobat supports pages up to 200 inches (14,400 points) on each side. An image wider or taller than 14,400 pixels makes a bigger page, and some viewers may not show it correctly. Resize it first.

Very large images: if your browser cannot handle an image at full size, the tool tries again with a smaller copy of about 16.8 megapixels (the same number of pixels as 4096 × 4096). This can happen on phones with very large photos, for example 48 megapixels. The page keeps the same size, but it holds fewer pixels. If even that fails, the image is skipped and named in the message.

Sideways phone photos are turned upright

Phones often save a photo in one direction and add a small note inside the file that says "turn this 90°". Photo apps and browsers read that note, but PDF viewers do not. So if a tool copies the photo as it is, the photo can appear sideways in the PDF.

This tool asks your browser to draw each photo using that note, so the pixels are saved the right way up. The page size follows the upright photo too. A portrait photo makes a portrait page. This works in current versions of Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari. If a photo still comes out sideways, your browser is probably out of date. Update it and try again.

File size, memory and hidden photo data

• The PDF is often about as big as your images added together. JPG photos are saved again at 92% quality, so ten 3 MB photos make a PDF of roughly 20 to 30 MB. PNG, GIF and BMP images are stored without loss, so large screenshots or drawings can make a big PDF. To get a smaller PDF, resize or compress the photos first. For a document that people read on screen, about 2000 pixels on the long side is usually enough.
• Hidden photo data is left out. Photos often carry EXIF data, such as the date, the camera model and the GPS location where the photo was taken. Because every image is drawn again, this data is not copied into the PDF. The PDF only holds the pixels you see.
• Large batches use a lot of memory. The images are prepared one at a time, so only one opened image is in memory at once. A 12-megapixel photo still needs about 50 to 100 MB while it is being prepared. The finished PDF is also held in memory until it downloads. On a phone, a very large batch can make the page slow or crash. Make a few smaller PDFs instead, and join them with Merge PDF.