Compress PDF
Reduce the size of a PDF file while preserving readability.
What is the Compress PDF?
The Compress PDF tool reduces the size of your PDF documents so you can email them, upload them to a form, or store them without hitting size limits. It analyses each page, downsamples embedded images, and re-encodes the file to remove redundant data — all while keeping the document readable.
Large PDFs are one of the most common headaches when applying for jobs, submitting official forms or attaching invoices. Government portals, university submissions and email providers often cap attachments at 5–25 MB. Compressing a heavy scan or a graphics-rich brochure down to that limit takes seconds with ToolSink.
Everything runs inside your browser. No file is ever sent to a remote server, so you can safely compress sensitive documents like ID cards, medical reports and financial statements.
How to use the Compress PDF
- 1Drop your PDF onto the upload area or click to select a file.
- 2Wait a moment for the tool to inspect the pages and estimate a compression ratio.
- 3Pick a quality level — lower quality yields smaller files, higher quality preserves crisper images.
- 4Click "Compress PDF" and let the tool re-encode images and optimise objects.
- 5Preview the resulting size and download the smaller PDF.
- 6If the file is still too large, run it again at a lower quality setting.
Key features
- Adjustable quality vs. size trade-off
- Automatic image downsampling and re-encoding
- Removes duplicate fonts, metadata and unused objects
- Keeps text sharp and selectable in most documents
- Works with scanned PDFs and native PDFs alike
- No file leaves your device
Examples
Job-portal upload
A 22 MB resume with a portfolio is compressed to 4 MB so it fits under the site’s 5 MB attachment cap.
Email attachment
A 40 MB scanned proposal shrinks to 8 MB — small enough for Gmail without needing Drive links.
University submission
A dissertation chapter of 60 MB is compressed to 18 MB, safely under the upload limit.
Why use this tool
- Smaller files send and open faster
- Reduces cloud storage bills
- Sidesteps upload limits on government and job portals
- Preserves text quality even at aggressive compression
- Improves page-load speed when the PDF is embedded on a website
Common use cases
- Compressing a resume or portfolio before uploading to a job site
- Emailing invoices without hitting attachment caps
- Uploading application forms to government portals
- Storing scanned records more efficiently
- Sharing marketing brochures over WhatsApp or Telegram
- Reducing the size of research papers before archiving
Frequently asked questions
How much can I shrink my PDF?
Image-heavy PDFs often shrink by 50–90%. Text-only PDFs may only reduce by 10–30% because there is less to compress.
Will the text stay searchable?
Yes. Compression targets images and structural data, not the underlying text layer.
Is compression lossy or lossless?
The tool uses lossy compression for embedded images (JPEG-like) and lossless compression for text and structure.
Does it strip metadata?
Unused metadata, thumbnails and duplicate resources are removed, but titles, authors and bookmarks are kept.
Can I compress a PDF twice?
You can, but the second pass gives diminishing returns and may reduce image quality noticeably.