PDF tool
Remove a password from a PDF
Tired of typing the same password every time you open a document you own? Enter it once here and get a copy without it. Nothing is uploaded — not the file, not the password.
- 100% free
- No signup
- Never uploaded
Drop your files here
or click to browse from your device
Supports PDF · Max 50 MB per file · Up to 2,000 pages
Settings
Never leaves your browser. There is no upload, so there is nowhere for us to log it even if we wanted to.
- Secure & privateYour files are never shared
- Lightning fastMost images in under a second
- High qualitymozjpeg and libvips under the hood
- Works everywhereAny device, any browser
Output quality
The document is decrypted by qpdf — the reference tool for this job — compiled to WebAssembly and run inside your tab. Page content, fonts, images, bookmarks, form fields and metadata all come through untouched, because nothing is re-rendered or re-compressed: the encryption layer is stripped and the underlying objects are written back out as they were. The output is a normal PDF that opens without a prompt. Two limits worth stating: the whole file has to fit in your browser tab alongside the WebAssembly module, which is why the size limit here is lower than on our other PDF tools, and a document you cannot open yourself cannot be opened here either.
See what this tool actually did to real files — median size change, speed and sample size, published whichever way the numbers fall.
Privacy: this tool does not upload your file
The file is never sent anywhere
This tool is JavaScript running in your tab. Your document is read from your disk into browser memory and never transmitted — not to us, not to anyone. It handles files up to 50 MB and 2,000 pages.
You can check this yourself
Load this page, turn off your internet connection, and run the tool. It still works. That is not a promise about our conduct — it is something you can verify in ten seconds.
Nothing to delete afterwards
There is no upload, no job record and no copy on any server, so there is no retention period. Close the tab and the working copy is gone with it.
No third parties involved
The PDF engine and its fonts are served from this domain rather than a public CDN, so no outside company sees that you used this page, or when.
Input, output and limits
Every figure below is read from the same configuration the server enforces, so this page cannot promise a limit the system will refuse.
- Input formats
- application/pdf
- Output format
- application/pdf
- Maximum file size
- 50 MB per file
- Maximum pages
- 2,000 per run
- Multiple files
- Yes — several files at once
- Price
- Free, with no account and no watermark
- Processing
- Inside your browser — the file is never uploaded
- Engine
- pdf-lib, running inside your browser
- File retention
- None — nothing is uploaded, so there is nothing to keep or delete
Common use cases
Bank and payslip statements
Many arrive encrypted with your date of birth or ID number. Unlock once, archive normally.
Documents going into a shared folder
Colleagues with legitimate access should not each need the password.
Making a document searchable on your machine
Desktop search skips encrypted files.
Before merging or splitting
Our other PDF tools cannot read encrypted files — unlock first, then edit.
Settings you can change
The password that opens the file
Never leaves your browser, and is not stored anywhere.
Never leaves your browser. There is no upload, so there is nowhere for us to log it even if we wanted to.
Troubleshooting
- It says the password did not work
- PDF passwords are case-sensitive, and statements often use a format like a date with no separators. Try exactly what you type when opening it in your reader.
- The file opens without a password but printing is blocked
- That is a permissions flag rather than encryption. This tool handles open-passwords; permission flags are advisory and most readers ignore them anyway.
- My file is over 50 MB
- The limit is browser memory, not policy — the file and the decryption engine share your tab. Split the document first if you can.
Something else went wrong? Tell us what happened — a person reads every report, and that is how this list gets longer.
Frequently asked questions
Browse pdf toolsDo I need to know the password?
Yes. This removes a password you can already open the file with; it does not break encryption or guess anything. If you cannot open the document yourself, this tool cannot either — and no honest tool can.
Where does my password go?
Nowhere. The whole thing runs as WebAssembly inside your browser tab, so the password never crosses the network and there is no server-side log it could land in. This is the reason the tool is built this way rather than the easier way — sending someone a document together with its password is exactly the combination that should never leave their machine.
Is this legal?
Removing a password from a document you are entitled to open is ordinary file management — the same thing you could do by opening it and saving a copy. What this does not do is circumvent protection on a document you cannot open, and that is a deliberate limit, not an oversight.
What about "permissions" restrictions?
Some PDFs are not password-protected to open but are flagged as no-printing or no-copying. Those flags are advisory — every reader is free to ignore them, and many do. This tool works on real password encryption, which is the kind that actually stops a file from opening.
Where does my file go when I use this tool?
Nowhere. This tool is JavaScript that runs inside your browser tab, so the file is read straight from your disk into memory on your own device and never sent to us. There is no upload, no job record and no copy to delete afterwards — close the tab and the working copy goes with it. You can confirm this yourself: load the page, disconnect from the internet, and the tool still works. It handles files up to 50 MB and 2,000 pages, and those limits come from what one browser tab can hold rather than from anything on our side.