How To Make A PDF

Portable Document Format (PDF) files are everywhere, and they are an incredibly useful way to share documents with others. PDFs are based on the PostScript language, and a big benefit they offer compared to something like a Word document is that they have a very fixed layout that stays consistent no matter where you open the file.

It’s the ideal way to share documents for printing or signing, or if you just want to ensure that it will look good when opened on any device. Creating a PDF file is thankfully very easy, so let’s take a look at the many ways you can do it.

How to convert a Word or Google Docs document to PDF

You can easily save a Word document to PDF using Word, Google Docs, and other apps. We will cover the specific steps for the two examples listed here, but the concept is similar in other programs.

How to save a document as a PDF in Microsoft Word

1. Open the document you want to save as a PDF and click the File option in the top left corner.
2. Select Save As or Save a Copythen browse to choose the location in which you want to save the file.
3. Click the dropdown menu that says Word document (.docx), find and choose the PDF option, then click Save.

   

If you’re using an older version of Microsoft Office, you might not see this option, in which case you will have to download a small plugin that can be downloaded from FileHippo. If you’re using a Mac, the process is mostly identical, though things will just look a bit different.

How to save a document as a PDF in Google Docs

Google Docs also lets you easily save files as PDFs by using the print feature method above and by simply downloading them as PDFs.

1. In Google Docs, first open the document you want to save as a PDF.
2. Click on the File tab in the top left corner of the document editing page.
3. Then click the Download option and a list of file types will appear.
4. Select the PDF option and the document will be downloaded to your computer in PDF format.

How to scan a file to PDF

If you’re trying to share a physical document as a PDF, there are many apps that let you do this, especially on smartphones. I personally love using Microsoft 365 for this, and you’ll want a good phone to get the best image quality, but you can really use any phone and choose from a wide range of different app options.

How to scan a document to PDF using a physical scanner

If you have a printer and scanner at hand, you can scan files into PDFs in a more professional way. Most scanners come with dedicated software for scanning, and you can use that to scan documents directly to create PDF files.

There are plenty of other scanner apps, though, including the official Windows Scan app on the Microsoft Store, which should work with any scanner. It hasn’t been updated in a long time, but it still works and it lets you scan files directly to PDF format. There’s also rPDFscan, which is a bit more up-to-date.

How to scan a document to PDF using a mobile app

First, you will need to choose a scanner app. By way of example, you could install Microsoft 365 on Android or iOS. After it is downloaded, just launch the Microsoft 365 app on your phone and follow the steps below:

1. Tap the Create or + (plus) button.
2. Choose Scan.
3. Point your phone’s camera at the document you want to scan and press the capture button.

   Alternatively, you can tap the Gallery button to open an existing photo.

4. Crop the document if necessary. Click Add to scan additional documents. And click Next to edit the scan with filters.
5. Click Next to export the file.
6. Select PDF as the file format, choose a location to save the file, then click Save.

In this example, we’re using the Microsoft 365 app to scan documents; but the process will be similar as well as slightly different, depending on which scanner app you’re using.

How to convert, split, and merge PDFs

Historically, if you wanted to convert a PDF into another format, split it into 2 separate PDFs, or merge it with another PDF, then you would need three different applications to do all of these tasks. Luckily, we now have websites that specialize in performing all three functions at the click of a button. One of the easiest sites which does this is ILovePDF, which lets you convert, split, and merge PDFs completely for free, with no sign up required or any annoying popups.

How to split PDFs

1. On the ILovePDF website, click on the Split PDF option.
2. Click on the Select PDF File button, or drop the PDF you want to split on the page for upload.
3. You now have the option to Split by range or Extract pages.
4. If you choose to Split by range, you can choose a custom range of pages to split from the original PDF. If you choose the Fixed Range option, you will split the PDF into multiple PDF documents containing 2 or 3 pages each.
5. If you choose the Extract pages option, you can extract all pages from the PDF, or choose specific pages to extract from the document.

How to merge PDFs

1. On the ILovePDF website, click on the Merge PDF option.
2. Click on the Select PDF File and upload the 2 PDFs you want to merge, or just drop them on the page to upload them.
3. Make sure you have a minimum of 2 PDFs so that you can combine them together.
4. Click the Merge PDF button, and the 2 documents will become 1 PDF.

How to convert PDFs

1. On the ILovePDF website, click on the (X) to PDF or PDF to (X) option, depending on what file type you’d like to convert it into, e.g. Excel to PDF or PDF to Excel.
2. Click on the Select PDF File and upload a PDF, or just drop the PDF on the page to upload it.
3. You can now select NO OCR if you want the document to be editable. Or you can select OCR if you want the document to be un-editable. (Unfortunately, the OCR control is only for the paid version of the site.)
4. Click on Convert to (X) button to convert your document to your preferred format.

How to print to PDF

The ability to use the print file option to download a document as a PDF is incredibly useful, and it’s actually available in a ton of apps since it’s a system-level feature. All you have to do is find the Print button in an app and choose Microsoft Print to PDF as the printer, and you’re good to go. You can do this in Microsoft Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Paint, or even the Photos app if you want to convert an image to PDF.

There’s almost no limit to where you can use the print-to-PDF feature, though you will have to keep an eye on formatting, as some things may not work that well when converted to PDF in this way. On smartphones, you can also achieve similar results using the Share button in many apps. You’ll then see a Print option you can use to electronically “print” content into a PDF file.

How to save a webpage as a PDF

It’s also possible to save a webpage as a PDF file, although sacrificing the interactive elements of it, of course. To do this, you can use the print method.

1. Navigate to the webpage you want to save and press Ctrl + P on your keyboard (or Print from the menu), which will “print” the webpage for you.
2. Next to Destination or Printerchoose Save as PDF or Microsoft Print to PDF (or similar option), then click Save.

There is going to be some loss of usability here, because websites aren’t really made to print or save as a PDF file. One possible solution for this would be to use a feature called reader modeavailable on many browsers, which strips a webpage of some unnecessary elements to make it more readable. Microsoft Edge has a particularly good reader mode (called Immersive Reader), and if you print a page this way, it will look much cleaner (albeit without images). That’s the method we used for the image above.

As you can see, there are plenty of ways to create a PDF file, whether you’re working on your laptop or using your phone to scan a document. It’s great to have so many options. Fortunately, PDF files are ubiquitous these days, so there are plenty of tools at your fingertips.

Want to make a PDF document with fields that others can fill in? We also have a guide on how to make a PDF fillable.