Create and Convert PDF Files

• Create PDFs in the Foxit PDF Editor Application Window
  • Create a PDF by Drag-and-Drop
  • Create a PDF from a File
  • Create PDFs from Multiple Files
  • Create a PDF from a Blank Page
  • Create a PDF from Clipboard
  • Create a PDF from a Web Page
  • Create a PDF Form from an Existing File
  • Create a PDF from a Template
• Create PDFs in Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint
• Create a PDF from Scanner
• Print to PDF
• Convert and Export PDF Files
• Create and Customize a PDF Portfolio
• Validate and Create PDF/A,PDF/E, and PDF/X-compliance Files
• OCR PDF Files

Create PDFs in the Foxit PDF Editor Application Window

Create a PDF by Drag-and-Drop

This method is best for small and simple files. Drag and drop any supported file (Microsoft Office, image, HTML, or TXT file) that you want to convert onto Foxit PDF Editor icon or Foxit PDF Editor application window, and the file will be converted to PDF and displayed in Foxit PDF Editor. Then you can click the Save button(or choose File > Save) to save the converted PDF file.

Tip: When creating a PDF from a Microsoft Office file, you will need to specify the conversion settings. For more information, please refer to "Office to PDF Settings".

Create a PDF from a File

You can create a PDF from Microsoft Office, image, HTML, or TXT files.

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > From File group > From File button.
  • Choose File menu > Create > From File.
  • Choose Convert > From Files > From File. 
• Select a file you want to convert, and click Open.
• (Optional) If you choose to convert a Microsoft Word, Excel, or PowerPoint file to PDF, the Office to PDF settings dialog box will pop up by default. Choose the way you want to convert the Office file to PDF, and click OK. (Tip: You can check Set Current Option as Default in the Office to PDF settings dialog box to set your current selection as the default way to convert Microsoft Office files.)
• Click Save button(or choose File > Save), and specify the file name and location to save the converted PDF file.

Tip: Foxit PDF Editor  provides two ways for you toconvert Microsoft Office files to PDFs, using the local service or Foxit Online Service. Before conversion, you can also go to File tab (or Foxit PDF Editor in the menu bar) > Preferences > Create PDF, and choose how you would like to convert Microsoft Office files to PDFs and specify whether or not to show the Office to PDF settings dialog box during conversion. If you choose to use the local service, please make sure that you have installed Microsoft Office 2016 or higher on your Mac device. If you choose to use Foxit Online Service, Internet connection is required during conversion.

Create PDFs from Multiple Files

Foxit PDF Editor allows you to easily merge files of different types into a single PDF file, or convert them into separate PDFs. When creating PDFs from multiple Microsoft Office files, please make sure that you have installed Microsoft Office 2016 or higher on your Mac device.

Convert and Combine Multiple Files into a Single PDF

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > Combine Files group > Combine Files button.
  • Choose Convert > Combine Files.
• In the Combine files into a single PDF dialog box, click Add files, and select one of the following options:
  • Add Files: You can choose files from local drives or click Open from ECM to select a file from ECM system and cloud services.
  • Add Folder: Choose a folder to add all the supported files in that folder to the “Combine files into a single PDF” list.
  • Add Open Files: Choose currently opened PDF files to add to the file list you want to combine.
  • Add PDF From Scanner: Scan documents to PDFs and add the scanned PDFs to the file list you want to combine. For the details about how to scan documents to PDF, please refer to Create a PDF from Scanner.
  • Add Web Page: Input a URL, or browse and select an HTML file you want to combine. Then click Add.
  • Add Clipboard: Create a PDF from the clipboard and add it to the file list you want to combine.  
• (Optional) By default, Foxit PDF Editor will use the name of each file as the root bookmark in the combined PDF file. To edit the bookmark, double-click the file (or right-click the file and choose Edit Bookmark for File) in the Combine files into a single PDF dialog box. If you do not want to add bookmarks when combining files, please change the setting in the Options dialog box.  
• (Optional) You can adjust the order of files to be displayed in the combined PDF by the files’ name, modified time, or size by clicking the corresponding column name. Or, adjust the order of files manually as desired by clicking the Move Up/Move Down button. Selecting a file and clicking the Remove button can delete the added file from the list.  
• (Optional) For a Microsoft Office file or PDF file, select it and click Choose Pages to specify the page range to be converted, if necessary.
• Click Options to specify the following options as desired, and click OK to continue.  
  • Always add bookmarks: Checking this option helps you add bookmarks in the combined PDF file, which uses the file names of each file as the root bookmarks and the original bookmarks from source files (if any) as the child bookmarks. When this option is checked, you can check Add a new table of contents page converted from bookmarks option to create a table of contents from the file names of each file in the combined PDF file.
  • Continue combining if an error occurs: If this option is checked, Foxit PDF Editor will continue combining files if an error occurs, and show the error messages after conversion.
  • Retain the logic page number during combination: If this option is checked, the combined PDF file will keep the logic page numbers in the original files.
• Click Combine.
• If you have added multimedia, Add Audio & Video dialog box will pop up. Specify the content settings and poster settings, and click OK. Each multimedia will be inserted as a new page in the combined PDF file.
• The combined PDF file will be opened with Foxit PDF Editor automatically after conversion. Then click the Save button  (or File > Save) to save the combined PDF file.

Convert Multiple Files into Separate PDF Files

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > From Multiple Files group > From Multiple Files button.
  • Choose File menu > Create > From Multiple Files.
  • Choose Convert > From Files > From Multiple Files.
• In the Convert Multiple Files dialog box, drag and drop the file or folder that you want to convert into the Arrange your files area, or click Add Files and choose Add Files/ Add Folder to select the files or folders you want to convert.
• (Optional) Files will be converted in a sequence as they are ordered in the Convert Multiple Files dialog box. You can adjust the order of files by its name, modified time, or size by clicking the corresponding column name. Alternatively, adjust the order of files manually by clicking the Move Up/Move Down button. Select a file and click the Remove button to delete it, if necessary. 
• (Optional) If you need to save the converted PDF files with the same name in the same location as the original file, check the Keep original file names and locations option.
• Click Convert.
• (Optional) If you did not check the Keep original file names and locations option, choose the folder in which you want to save the converted PDF files in the pop-up dialog box, and click Open.

Create a PDF from a Blank Page

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > Blank group > Blank button.
  • Choose File menu > Create > From Blank Page.
  • Choose Convert > Blank.
• (Optional) Use the typewriter tool or edit tools to add contents in the blank page.
• Click the Save button  (or File > Save) to save the file.

Create a PDF from Clipboard

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > From Clipboard group > From Clipboard button.
  • Choose File menu > Create > From Clipboard.
  • Choose Convert > From Clipboard.
• The texts or images in the clipboard will be converted to a new PDF file.

Create a PDF from a Web Page

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > From Web Page group > From web page button.
  • Choose File menu > Create > From Web Page.
  • Choose Convert > From Web Page.
• In the pop-up Create PDF From Web Page dialog box, do the following:
  • In the URL field, input the URL address of a web page, or choose a URL address that you have input before from the drop-down list.
  • (Optional) If you would like to convert a web page which is saved as a HTML file (*.html, *.htm, *.shtml) in your local disk, click Browse to choose the file.
  • Click Settings to specify the settings about conversion and page layout.
  • Click Create.
• The converted PDF file will be opened in Foxit PDF Editor automatically. Click the Save button  (or File > Save) to save the file.

Tip: While creating a PDF from a webpage which requires login, only the login page will be converted to PDF. For example, when you try to create a PDF from Foxit Support Ticket webpage (https://www.foxit.com/support/ticket.html) which requires you to log in to your Foxit Account, the contents in the login page will be converted to PDF.

Create a PDF Form from an Existing File

You can create a PDF form directly from an existing file during which Foxit PDF Editor will detect and recognize the form fields automatically, with no need to use the Run Form Field Recognition command.

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > Form > From a File.
  • Choose File menu > Create > Create Form.
  • Choose Convert > Form.
• In the pop-up dialog box, navigate through your local disk to select a local file, or click Open from ECM to select a file from ECM systems or cloud services. Then click Open to start the conversion.
• A PDF with form fields if any is created and opened with Foxit PDF Editor. You can still use the form field tools to edit the form fields, if necessary. For more information, please refer to “Manage Form Fields”.
• Click the Save button (or File > Save) to save the file.

Create a PDF from a Template

Foxit PDF Editor provides various designed templates including letters, resume, invoice, and more. You can choose the desired template and quickly create a PDF from it.

• Click Convert > From Template, or File > Create > From Template. A new file tab named “Template” opens automatically in the application window.
• Navigate through various templates in the Template tab and click on the desired template to preview it in a dialog box. (Tip: To search for a template, enter a search word like letter, resume, or invoice in the Search template box. Or, select a category under the search box like Business, Marketing, or Human Resources, and choose a desired template.)
• Click Edit Now to open the selected template in a new file tab.
• Save it as your own PDF document after making edits.

Note: An Internet connection is required to use the feature. 

Create PDFs in Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint

Foxit PDF Editor enables you to create professional PDF files from Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, and PowerPoint), automatically keeping links, hyperlinks, outline and more of the source files in the created PDFs.

After you have installed Foxit PDF Editor, Foxit PDF Editor add-in will be loaded in the Foxit PDF tab in your Microsoft Office applications, which allows you to quickly create PDF files and change your conversion settings in just a few clicks. To use this feature, you need to sign in or activate Foxit PDF Editor.

Create PDFs

• Open a file in Microsoft Word, Excel, or PowerPoint, and click the Foxit PDF tab.
• (Optional) Before creating a PDF, you can click Advanced to customize your PDF conversion settings. For more information, please refer to “Customize Conversion Settings”.
• Do one of the following:
  • To create a PDF using the current settings, click Create PDF. Then enter the file name, specify the location, and click Save.
  • To create and email a PDF using the current settings, click Create and email. Then enter the file name, specify the location, and click Save. The created PDF file will be attached to your mail system automatically for you to send out.
  Tip: Depending on your system settings or the application you used, you may need to specify additional settings (e.g., grant access to a file, choose the worksheets to be converted, etc.) during the conversion. Please follow the on-screen instructions to complete the settings.

Customize Conversion Settings

Before creating PDFs using the Foxit PDF Editor add-in in Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, you can click Foxit PDF > Advanced in Microsoft Office applications to customize your PDF conversion settings.

• Foxit Conversion Settings
  • Default Settings: Choose a type of conversion quality. For more information, please refer to “Default Settings”. 
  • Target Folder: You can click Browse to specify a default destination folder to store all of the PDF files generated, and the names of the generated PDF files will be the same as the originals by default. If you choose Prompt for file name, a dialog box will prompt for you to specify a name and location for the PDF.
  • If File Exists: If a PDF file that has the same name and path as the generated PDF file already exists, you can choose any of the following:
    • Overwrite existing file: Replace the existing file with the generated file.
    • Prompt User: Prompt you to specify the location and the name for the generated document during PDF creation.
  • View PDF Results: Once the conversion is finished, the converted PDF will be opened with Foxit PDF Editor automatically. This option is checked by default.
  • Preserve Documents Properties: Keep the document properties of the source file in the converted PDF during the conversion. This option is checked by default.  
• Application Settings
  • Create Bookmarks (Excel and PowerPoint only): In Excel/PPT, the sheet name and the slide title (or the slide page number) will be converted to bookmarks in the generated PDF. This option is checked by default.
  • Preserve Slide Transitions (PowerPoint only): Include the slide transitions that were created in PowerPoint in the converted PDF as PDF transition effects.
  • Convert Hidden Slides to PDF Pages (PowerPoint only): Convert the hidden slides in PowerPoint to PDF pages during the conversion.
  • Convert Speaker Notes (PowerPoint only): Convert the speaker notes added in PowerPoint to Note comments in the generated PDF.
  • Page Range/Slide Range: Specify the pages (for Word) or slides (for PowerPoint) you want to convert.
  • Conversion Options (Excel only): Selects one of the following options to convert worksheets.
    • Actual Size: Convert the worksheet to PDF using the actual size specified in the worksheet.
    • Fit the Entire Worksheet to a single page: Automatically adjusts the size of the worksheet so that all the entries on that worksheet appear on the same page in the generated PDF.   
    • Fit the Worksheet to the Width of PDF page: Automatically adjusts the width of the worksheet so that all the columns on that worksheet appear on one page in the generated PDF.

Create a PDF from Scanner

Foxit PDF Editor allows you to create a PDF directly from a paper document using your Image Capture (ICA) scanner driver.

Scan with Custom Settings

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > From Scanner group > From Scanner button > Scan.
  • Choose File menu > Create > From Scanner.
  • Choose Convert or Home > From Scanner > Scan.
• In the Scan dialog box, select a scanner and related options:
  • Configure scanner
    • Prompt to scan more pages: Select this option, a dialog box will pop up to ask you whether to scan more pages whenever the scanning completes. If the option is unselected, for single-sided scanning, you'll not be prompted once the scanning completes.
    • Sides: Specify single or double-sided scanning. If you select Both Sides but the settings of the scanner are for only one side, the scanner setting overrides the Foxit settings.
    • Source: Select the input source for scanning, including Feeder and Flatbed. If documents are placed in both feeder and flatbed, both of them will be scanned, but the one in feeder will be scanned first by default.
    • Color Mode: Select a basic color mode (Color, Black and White, or Grayscale) supported by your scanner.
    • Paper Size: Select a paper size.
    • Resolution: Select a resolution supported by your scanner.
  • Output
    • New PDF Document: Output the scanning results as a new PDF document.
    • Append: Append the converted scan to an existing PDF file. After selecting this option, click Browse to find and select an existing PDF file from your local disk.
  • Optimize Scanned PDF
    • Reduce size and optimize: Check this item and click Options to customize compression and filtering. The Optimization Options dialog box for image settings controls how scanned images are compressed for the PDF.
      • Color/Gray settings: When scanning color or gray pages, select JPEG, JPEG2000(Lossless) or JPEG2000(Lossy) to apply JPEG compression to the entire gray or RGB input page. Select High-Compression to apply image compression in high-quality with small size.
      • Low/High Quality: Drag the slider to set the balance point between file size and quality.
      • Monochrome: When scanning black-and-white or monotone images, select one of the following:
        • JBIG 2(Lossless)/ JBIG2(Lossy): Apply an image compression standard for bi-level images which is suitable for lossless or lossy compression.
        • CCITT Group 4: Apply CCITT Group 4 compression to black-and-white input page images.
        • High-Compression: Apply to high-quality with small size compression.
      • Deskew: Choose On to automatically rotate any page so that the text is vertically aligned, which is of great use for cleaning up scanned PDFs.
    • Make Searchable (Run OCR): Check this item and click Options to run OCR on scanned PDFs. Please refer to "Recognize Text" for more information.
• (Optional) If you want to save the current scanning settings as a preset, click Save as Preset in the Scan dialog box. Then input the preset name, and click Save.
• Click Scan.
• When prompted whether to scan more pages or reverse sides (available if you chose Both Sides in the Sides option), choose a desired option, and click OK.
• When the scanning is complete, the new scanned PDF or the existing PDF with the scanned pages appended at the end will automatically be opened, with the Post-Scan Options panel displayed on the right of the document pane. In the Post-Scan Options panel, choose any of the options below to manage the scanning results, if necessary.
  • Optimize Scanned PDF: Optimize the scanned PDF for a smaller size and better display effect. See also "Optimize Scanned PDF".
  • OCR Current File: Run OCR in the current scanned PDF after saving the document. See also "Recognize Text".
  • Page Organize: Open the Organize toolbar for you to organize your PDF pages. See also "Organize PDF Pages".
  • Grayscale/ Black & White: Adjust the color mode of the scanned PDF. You can change the mode from Color to Grayscale/ Black & White, or from Grayscale to Black & White; but not the reverse.
  • Edit Document Information: Modify the scanned document information including Author, Title, and File name.
• Click the Save button  (or File > Save) to save the scanned PDF file.

Scan with a Configured Preset

If you have saved your previous scanning settings as presets or configured scanning presets, all your presets will be displayed in the From Scanner drop-down list in the Convert tab. You can choose any of the presets to scan a paper document to PDF with just one click.

Configure Scanning Presets

Create a Scanning Preset

• When you create a PDF from a scanner with custom settings, you can save your custom scanning settings as a preset in the Scan dialog box. Please refer to "Save as Presets" for details.
• Choose From Scanner > Manage presets in the Convert / Home tab or File tab to open the Manage Presets dialog box, and then click Create to create a new scanning preset. Please refer to “Scan with Custom Settings” for more information about how to configure the scanning options.

Manage Scanning Presets

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > From Scanner group > From Scanner button > Manage Presets.  
  • Choose Convert or Home > From Scanner > Manage presets.
• In the Manage Presets dialog box, select the scanning preset that you want to manage, and do the following.
  • To edit the preset, click Edit, and follow the instructions in "Scan with Custom Settings" to configure the scanning options.
  • To delete the preset, click Delete.
  • To re-order the preset shown in the From Scanner drop-down list, click Move Up or Move Down.
  • Upon completion, click Close to close the Manage Preset dialog box.

Print to PDF

When you have installed Foxit PDF Editor on your device, you can use the Print to PDF feature to save a document as PDF from any application that uses the system print dialog in your Mac device.

Create a PDF Using the Print to PDF Feature

• Open a file in your macOS application.
• Click File > Print.
• Choose Save as Foxit PDF from the PDF dropdown list.
• In the Sava as Foxit PDF dialog box, specify the following options and click OK.
  • Default Settings: Choose a type of conversion quality. There are five predefined sets of default settings shown as below. You can click Edit to create and modify your customized default settings as needed. For more information, please refer to “Create and Modify your Customized Default Settings”.
    • High Quality Print: Create PDF files with high quality print but with relatively large file sizes.
    • PDF/A-1b: Create PDF files in compliance with PDF/A-1b standard.
    • Smallest File Size: Create PDF files used for web distribution.
    • Standard: Create PDF files with a balance between print quality and file size.
    • USPTO: Create PDF files that are compliant with USPTO (the United States Patent and Trademark Office) standards.
    • Target Folder: You can click Browse to specify a default destination folder to store all of the PDF files generated, and the names of the generated PDF files will be the same as the originals by default. With no target folder specified:
      • If you choose Prompt for file name, a dialog box will prompt for you to specify a name and location for the PDF.
      • If you choose Documents/*.pdf, the generated PDF files will be automatically saved to the Documents folder.
    • If File Exists: If a PDF file that has the same name and path as the generated PDF file already exists, you can choose any of the following:
      • Overwrite existing file: Replace the existing file with the generated file.
      • Add a numeric suffix: Add a numeric suffix to the name of the generated document automatically to avoid overwriting the existing files.
      • Prompt User: Prompt you to specify the location and the name for the generated document during PDF creation.
      • Insert before existing file: Insert the generated PDF at the beginning of the existing file. If the existing file is a PDF portfolio, the generated PDF will be added as a component file in the portfolio. (Note: If the existing file is encrypted, inaccessible, or an XFA file, or due to unknown errors, the operation will fail and a .log file automatically opens to show the detailed information.)
      • Insert after existing file: Insert the generated PDF at the end of the existing file. If the existing file is a PDF portfolio, the generated PDF will be added as a component file in the portfolio. (Note: If the existing file is encrypted, inaccessible, or an XFA file, or due to unknown errors, the operation will fail and a .log file automatically opens to show the detailed information.)
    • Target File: If you have chosen Insert before existing file or Insert after existing file in the If File Exists item, you can browse and select the target file, or choose Prompt User and you will be prompted to choose the target file when creating PDFs. 
    • View PDF Results: Once the conversion is finished, the converted PDF will be opened with Foxit PDF Editor automatically. This option is checked by default.
• Based on your settings in the previous steps, do the following:
  • If you choose Prompt for file name in the Target Folder item, specify the file name and location in the pop-up Save dialog box to save the converted PDF file.
  • If you choose Insert before existing files or Insert after existing files in the If File Exists item and does not specify the target file, select the target file in the pop-up Open dialog box, and click Open to append the converted PDF file to an existing PDF file you have selected.

Create and Modify your Customized Default Settings

• From the Default Settings item in the Save as Foxit PDF dialog box, select a set of default settings.
• Click the Edit button to specify the conversion settings in the pop-up dialog box. For more information, please refer to “Options of Default Settings for PDF Conversion”.
• (Optional) To toggle between different sets of the default settings while editing the conversion settings, click the Edit Settings button in the <Default Settings> (e.g. Standard) dialog box, and double-click the desired item in the Edit Settings window.
• After you complete the settings, click OK to save the modification to the current set of default settings or click the Save As button to save the modified settings as a new set of default settings which will be added to the Default settings list. The predefined sets of default settings cannot be modified.

Options of Default Settings for PDF Conversion

General Tab

• Description: Enter a summary for the current conversion setting.
• Optimize for fast web view: Create a linearized PDF that can be opened and viewed even before the whole file is downloaded. 
• Compatible With: With Foxit PDF Editor, you can choose the version number from 1.3 to 1.7 when creating PDFs. Choosing the right PDF reference version can help the PDFs to be better compatible with different PDF viewers.
• Add PDF information to the document: This option allows you to set PDF document properties, such as Title, Subject, Author, etc. You can add information when it is checked.

Images Tab

Specify the image conversion settings. For more information, please refer to “Compress Images”.

PDF Standards Tab

Select a PDF standard as needed from the menu under which there is the corresponding description for your reference.

Watermarks Tab

• Add watermarks to the document: If you want to add watermarks to your document, you can select this option and choose to add Image Watermarks or Text Watermarks.
• Image Watermarks
  • Image
    You can browse your computer for an image and change the Opacity and Rotation of the image which will be added into your document as a watermark.
  • Offsets
    This option allows you to adjust the specific position of the watermark by specifying the unit of measurement and the distance from the left or top edge of the generated PDF page.
  • Scale
    • To resize the watermark in relation to the original image size, check Absolute Scale and enter a number in the percentage box.
    • To resize the watermark in relation to the PDF page dimensions, check Relative Page and enter a number in the percentage box. 
  • Preview
    You can see how the watermark will look like with the selected options.
• Text Watermarks
  • Font
    This option is activated only when Text Watermarks is selected and you can choose the font name, font size and font color from the drop-down menus and color palette.
  • Text
    You can enter text in the Content box and change the Opacity and Rotation of the text which will be added into your document as a watermark.
  • Offsets
    This option allows you to adjust the specific position of the watermark by specifying the unit of measurement and the distance from the left or top edge of the generated PDF page.
  • Preview
    You can see how the watermark will look like with the selected options.

Headers/Footers Tab

• Add Headers/Footers to the Document: This option allows you to add headers/footers to your PDF document. By checking this option, the following options will be activated.
• Font
  Specify the font, font size, and font color for the headers and footers.  
• Edit
  This option allows you to edit headers/footers. You can enter text in the columns (Left Column, Center Column and Right Column) if needed. Click Insert Date to insert date to the PDF document. Click Insert Page Number to insert page number to the PDF document.
• Offsets
  This option allows you to change the unit of measurement and specify the margins for all 4 sides.  
• Preview
  You can see how the headers/footers will look with the selected options.

Security Tab

The security feature of PDF gives you exceptional control over PDF files. You can choose Password Protection and Certificate Protection from the drop-down menu to protect the converted PDF files with passwords or certificates. For more information, please refer to “Protect PDFs with Passwords or Certificates”.

Convert and Export PDF Files

Convert PDF Files

Convert a PDF to Other Formats

Foxit PDF Editor allows users to convert a PDF to Microsoft Office, image, HTML, text file, or XML 1.0 file. If the document is an accessible PDF, you can save it as accessible text which can contain assistive information (such as alternate text descriptions) for images or multimedia objects in the PDF. Accessible text is often used for a braille printer by which accessible text can be imported and printed out as a form that vision-impaired people can use.

• (Optional) If you try to convert and export a scanned PDF file or an image-based PDF file, recognize the text in the PDF file to make it searchable or editable first. Please refer to OCR PDF Files for more information.
• Do any of the following:
  • Click Convert, and select one of the following options:  
    • To MS Office: Convert the PDF to Microsoft Word (.doc or .docx) /Excel/PowerPoint/XML Spreadsheet 2003.
    • To Image: Convert the PDF to image as a PNG, JPEG, JPEG2000, TIFF, or BMP file.
    • To HTML: Export the PDF file as a HTML file which could be opened in your browser.
    • To Others: Convert the PDF file as an XML 1.0 file, or as a plain text, rich text, or accessible text file.
  • Click File in the menu bar > Save as. Or click File in the Ribbon > Save As > Computer, and choose a recent folder or click Browse to browse for more folders.
  • Click File in the Ribbon > Export, select the output format, and click Save As.
    Tip: When you hover your mouse over an output format in the Export window, the Settings icon  will appear, which allows you to configure the conversion settings for the selected format. See also “Conversion Settings”.
• In the pop-up dialog box, specify the following settings:
  • If necessary, change the file name and output folder in the Save As field and Where field respectively. Optionally, you can click Save to ECM to save the output file to ECM systems or cloud services.
  • If you have already specified the output format by choosing the option in the Convert toolbar or Export window, the output format specified will be selected as default in the file type drop-down list. If you choose the Save As command, please select the output format from the file type drop-down list.
  • Click Settings to specify the page range and export settings, and click OK to close the Save as <file type> setting dialog box. For more information, please refer to “Conversion Settings”.
  • (Optional) Select View Result to open the output file after the conversion process is completed.
  • Click Save to start the conversion and save the exported file.  

Conversion Settings

When converting a PDF file to other formats, you can click the Settings button adjacent to the selected output format in the Save As dialog box (or click the Settings icon  beside the output format in the Export window under the File page) to specify the conversion settings. Options vary based on the type of the output file you have selected.   

Options for Microsoft Office, XML Spreadsheet, RTF, and TXT

• Page Range: Choose the page range you want to export.

• Content Settings/Comments Setting: Specify whether to include the comments and images in the output. The settings are available when you export a PDF to RTF, Microsoft Word, and PowerPoint, and will be grayed out if you choose Convert to editable documents in Text Recognition Settings. When converting a PDF file to Microsoft PowerPoint, you can only choose to include comments in the output file.

• Layout Settings: Specify whether to retain the text flow or page layout in the output. This is only available when you export PDF to Word and RTF files.

• Numeric Settings: Specify the decimal separator and thousands separator, so that Foxit PDF Editor will recognize the numeric data based on your setting. The settings are available when you export a PDF to Microsoft Excel or XML spreadsheet, and will be grayed out if you choose Convert to editable documents in Text Recognition Settings.
  • Auto detect decimal and thousands separators – Detect the numeric settings based on the document.
  • Treat the following as decimal and thousands separators – Select this option and select symbols for the decimal separator and thousands separator.
• Excel Workbook Settings: Choose an option to create worksheets. The settings are available when you export a PDF to Microsoft Excel or XML spreadsheet, and will be grayed out if you choose Convert to editable documents in Text Recognition Settings.
  • Create single Worksheet for the Document – The PDF will be exported to a single Worksheet.
  • Create Worksheet for each Table – Each table in the PDF will be exported to a separate Worksheet. (Note: A table in a PDF is not always displayed in Table form with columns and rows. The application sometimes considers the head and tail of the page as virtual tables, so there is also a situation where non-Table content is displayed separately on a Worksheet).
  • Create Worksheet for each Page – Each PDF page is exported to a single Worksheet.
    Note: The exported Worksheets are automatically named as “Table1”, “Table2”, “Table3” …
• Text Recognition Settings: Specify whether to run OCR on PDF files that contain images. To recognize the text in images and make them editable, choose Convert to editable documents, and click Set Languages to select the OCR language. Otherwise, choose Skip images in documents to retain the images as un-editable image objects. The settings are not available when you export a PDF to a TXT file or XML spreadsheet.

• Restore Default: Revert to the original default settings.  

Options for HTML

• Page Range: Choose the page range you want to export.

• Content Settings: Select Include Images to export images in the PDF. This option is not available if you choose Convert to editable documents in Text Recognition Settings.

• File and Navigation Pane Settings: Choose Single HTML Page to export the PDF to a single HTML file, and you can add headings and bookmarks in the navigation pane of the output HTML file; or choose Multiple HTML Pages to split the PDF by its headings or bookmarks into several HTML files. The settings are not available if you choose Convert to editable documents in Text Recognition Settings.

• Text Recognition Settings: Specify whether to run OCR on PDF files that contain images. For more information, please refer to “Text Recognition Settings”.

• Restore Default: Revert to the original default settings.  

Options for PNG, JPEG, JEPG 2000, TIFF, and BMP

• Output Mode: If you choose Export by page, each page in the original PDF document will be saved as a separate image file whose name will be the original document name appended with the page number. If you choose Merge into one image, the PDF will be exported to one image file.

• Page Range: Choose the page range you want to export.

• File Settings
  • Interlace: Specify whether to export the PDF to an Adam7 interlaced PNG image. An Adam7 interlaced PNG image enables web browsers to display a low-resolution version of the image at first, but gradually improve it as the downloading goes on. Adam7 allows viewers to see the image before the whole image is downloaded, but increases the file size. (Available for PNG only)
  • Filter: Select a filtering algorithm. If you are not sure which filter to use, select Adaptive and the filtering algorithm best suited for the image will be applied. (Available for PNG only)
  • Grayscale/Color/Monochrome: Specify a compression standard according to your requirements for the file size and the image quality. The Monochrome option is available for TIFF format. The Grayscale and Color options are available for JPEG, JPEG 2000, and TIFF formats.
  • Format: Select a format to determine how to display a JPEG image. (Available for JPEG only)
  • Tile Size: Specify a value for the tile size. See also Tile Size in the Advanced optimization options section. (Available for JPEG2000 only)
• Color Management: Specify the color management for the output file and whether to embed an ICC profile into the output file.

• Conversion: Specify the color space and resolution for the output file. Choose Auto or Determine automatically, and Foxit PDF Editor will determine these settings automatically. To change the resolution unit from pixels/inch to pixels/cm, go to File in the Ribbon (or Foxit PDF Editor in the menu bar) > Preferences > Measuring and choose Centimeters or Millimeters for Measurement Units.

• Defaults: Revert to the original default settings.  

Export Selected Area to Other Formats

You can select an area with the Select Text and Image command in PDF and export the content in the area to formats including Microsoft Office, HTML, or Rich Text.

• Click Select > Select Text and Image in any tab except for the File/Help/Accessibility tab.
• Click and drag an area in your PDF you want export. Then right-click the selected area and choose Export Selection As.
• In the pop-up dialog box, choose the file format you want to export to and its conversion settings, specify the filename and location, and click Save.  

Export All Images in the PDFs

Foxit PDF Editor enables you to export all images in your document to separate image files in JPEG, JPEG 2000, PNG, TIFF, or BMP format.

• Click Convert > Export All Images.
• In the pop-up dialog box, do the following:
  • Specify the file name and location.
  • Choose an image format from the file type drop-down list. And click Settings to specify the page range and export settings. See also “Conversion Settings”. In the Extraction settings, for Exclude images smaller than, select the smallest size of the image to be extracted, i.e., only images whose width and height do not exceed the selected length will be extracted. Select No limit to extract all images in the document.
  • Click Save to start the conversion and save the exported images.

Tip: To export one image in your PDF, select the Select Text and Image command and right-click the image and choose Save Image As.

Create and Customize a PDF Portfolio

PDF portfolios are a combination of files with different formats such as Microsoft Office files, text documents and image files. Foxit PDF Editor lets you quickly create and customize a PDF portfolio.

Create a PDF Portfolio

You can use Foxit PDF Editor to quickly create a blank PDF portfolio or a new PDF portfolio from any file. After creation, you can also add more files/folders, create folders, delete files/folders and more within the PDF portfolio.

Create a Blank PDF Portfolio

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > PDF Portfolio > Blank Portfolio.
  • Choose File menu > Create > Create a blank PDF Portfolio.
  • Choose Convert > PDF Portfolio > Create a blank PDF Portfolio.
• A blank PDF portfolio will be created and opened in Foxit PDF Editor. You can add files and folders to the PDF portfolio, if necessary. For more information, please refer to “Add Files and Folders in a PDF Portfolio”.

Create a PDF Portfolio from Files

• Do any of the following:
  • Choose File in the Ribbon > Create > PDF Portfolio > Portfolio.
  • Choose File menu > Create > Create a new PDF Portfolio.
  • Choose Convert > PDF Portfolio > Create a new PDF Portfolio.
• In the pop-up dialog box, select the files that you want to attach to a PDF portfolio from your local disk, and click Open.

When creating a new PDF portfolio (not blank), you can create a Table of Contents (TOC) which will be displayed following the cover sheet of portfolio. Before that, you need to select the Create a Table of Contents in Cover Sheet when creating a PDF portfolio option in File in the Ribbon (or Foxit PDF Editor in the menu bar)> Preferences > Create PDF.

The headings of the TOC generated is made up of the names of folders (including the subfolders) and files in the portfolio, arranged in an order that the files and folders are displayed in the portfolio. For a PDF portfolio with TOC, if any file/folder is added or removed, you can click Regenerate TOC in the Portfolio tab to update the TOC; for a PDF portfolio without TOC, you can click Regenerate TOC to create a TOC.

Customize a PDF Portfolio

When a PDF portfolio is created and opened in Foxit PDF Editor, the Portfolio tab will be displayed for you to customize a PDF portfolio.

Add Files and Folders in a PDF Portfolio

• In the Portfolio tab, click Create Folder to create a new folder within the PDF portfolio. Click Add Files, Add Open Files, or Add Folder to add your local files, opened files, or folders (including its subordinate folders) to the PDF portfolio respectively.
• In the Layout or Detail view mode, right-click on the blank area or any file in a PDF portfolio, and choose the corresponding option from the context menu to create folders or add files/folders to the PDF portfolio.

Remove Files and Folders in a PDF Portfolio

In the Layout or Detail view mode, do any of the following to remove a file or folder from a PDF portfolio.

• Right-click the file or folder that you want to remove, and choose Delete from the context menu.
• Select the file or folder that you want to remove, and click the Delete button .

Extract Files or Folders from a PDF Portfolio

You can extract files or folders in the PDF portfolio and save them in your local disk. Steps are as follows:

• In the Layout or Detail view mode, do any of the following:
  • Right-click the files or folders that you want to extract, and choose Extract from Portfolio.
  • Select the files or folders that you want to extract, and then click the Extract button .
• In the pop-up dialog box, do the following:
  • When extracting files, specify the file name and location to save the files, and click Save.
  • When extracting folders, select the local folder that you want to save the extracted folders, and click Open.

Validate and Create PDF/A-, PDF/E-, and PDF/X-compliant Files

With Foxit PDF Editor, you can validate PDF contents against PDF/A, PDF/E, and PDF/X standard, and create industry compliant PDF files for archiving, engineering, and print production.

Validate PDFs against PDF/A, PDF/E, or PDF/X Standard

• Click Convert > Preflight.
• In the Standards Validation and Creation dialog box, do the following:
  • In the Profiles tab, expand a compliance profile, and choose the desired verification profile (Verify compliance with <compliance_name> option).
  • By default, Foxit PDF Editor will perform preflight on all pages and display the analysis results. To perform preflight on specific pages, specify the page range in Preflight only pages item.
  • Click Analyze to verify the PDF file.
  • Check the validation results in Results tab, and click Create Report to save the validation report.

Convert PDFs to PDF/A, PDF/E, or PDF/X

Convert PDFs to PDF/A, PDF/E, or PDF/X Using a Profile

• Click Convert > Preflight.
• In the Standards Validation and Creation dialog box, do any of the following:
  • In the Profiles tab, expand the compliance profile, and select the desired conversion profile (Convert to <compliance_name> option). If you want to check the analysis results after conversion, make sure that you have checked the Display Analysis Result option. Then click Analyze and fix to convert and save the file.
  • In the Standards tab, select the desired standard (Save as <Compliance_name> option) > click Continue > select the desired version > click Save as to convert and save the file.
• (Optional) The converted file will be opened with Foxit PDF Editor automatically. If you choose to view the analysis results during conversion, check the analysis results and create analysis report in the Results tab of the Standards Validation and Creation dialog box.

Save PDFs as PDF/A, PDF/E, or PDF/X

When reading a PDF document in Foxit PDF Editor, you can save the PDF document as a copy which is compliant with PDF/A, PDF/E, or PDF/X standard on your local disk. Steps are as follow:

• Choose File in the menu bar > Save as. Or choose File in the Ribbon > Save As > Computer, and then choose a recent folder or click Browse to browse for more folders.
• In the pop-up dialog box, do the following:
  • If necessary, change the file name and output folder in the Save As field and Where field respectively.
  • Choose PDF/A (*.pdf), PDF/E (*.pdf), or PDF/X (*.pdf) from the file type drop-down list.
  • Click Settings to choose the desired version in the Standards Validation and Creation dialog box, and click OK to apply the setting.
  • Click Save.

Remove PDF/A, PDF/E, or PDF/X Information

• Click Convert > Preflight.  
• In the Standards Validation and Creation dialog box, do the following:
  • In the Profiles tab, expand the compliance profile, and select the Remove <compliance_name> information option you want.
  • If you want to check the analysis results, please make sure that you have checked the Display Analysis Result option.
  • Click Analyze and fix. 
• In the pop-up dialog box, specify the file name and location, and click Save to save the updated file.
• (Optional) If you choose to display the analysis results, the results will be displayed in the Results tab when the operation finishes. Click Create Report in the Results tab to save the analysis report, if needed.

OCR PDF Files

OCR (Optical Character Recognition) is a software process that enables images or printed text to be translated into machine-readable text. OCR is most commonly used on scanned PDF documents to make the text searchable or editable.

Quick OCR

You can click Home > Quick Recognize or Convert in the Ribbon > Convert > Quick Recognize to recognize all pages of a scanned or image-based PDF with default or previous settings by one-click.

Recognize Text

Foxit PDF Editor can detect whether a PDF file is scanned or image-based and make corresponding suggestions to initiate OCR when you open or try to edit a scanned or image-based PDF. When you open a scanned or image-based PDF file, a message will pop up in the top right corner to inform you that the PDF contains some unrecognized text. You can click Recognize Text in the message box to initiate OCR. By default, when you try to edit the text in a non-editable PDF using the Edit Text command, Foxit PDF Editor will display a prompt message including options for you to recognize text with the default or custom settings. You can also enable Foxit PDF Editor to run OCR automatically when you try to edit text in a non-editable PDF. To configure the automatic OCR settings, choose File in the Ribbon (or Foxit PDF Editor in the menu bar) > Preferences > Editing, and specify the following options as needed.

• Alert when there’s no editable text when using ‘Edit Text’ tool: An alert will pop up notifying the user when there’s no editable text while using the Edit Text command. By default, this option is selected.
• Recognize Text: Select this option to run OCR automatically when you use the Edit Text command in a scanned PDF.    
• Scanned Document Editing Settings: Click it to open a dialog box to specify the OCR settings when recognizing text in a scanned PDF. You can select the language used to recognize text, and the two options:
  • Use Available System Font: Select this option to convert text in the scanned PDF to editable text using a substitution font available in your system that is similar to that of the original text. This option is selected by default.
  • Make All the Pages Editable: Select this option to recognize and convert text in all pages of the scanned PDF to editable text at once.  

Except for initiating OCR based on the prompt messages, you can also run OCR anytime to recognize the image-based text in a PDF. Steps are as follow:

• Click Convert in the Ribbon > Convert > Recognize Text, and choose Current File to recognize text in the current file, or choose Multiple Files to recognize text in multiple PDF files.
• (Optional) If you choose to recognize text in multiple files, follow the steps below to select files and specify the output options in the pop-up dialog box:
  • Click Add files, and choose Add Files, Add Folder, or Add Open Files to add a file, folder, or opened file.
  • After adding the files, use the Move up or Move down button to reorder the files, if necessary.
  • Click Remove to remove the added file from the list, if necessary.
  • Click Output Options to select the destination folder, and choose how to name the new file and whether to overwrite an existing one.
  • Click OK.
• In the Recognize Text dialog box, do the following:
  • Specify the page range to be OCRed. The page range options are available when you choose to recognize the text in the current PDF document.
  • Select the language (s) used in your document.

    Tip: For some languages, you will need to download the language packs as prompted when OCRing the document.

  • In the output type, select Searchable Image Text or Searchable Image Text (original image) to make the image text selectable and searchable, or select Editable Text to enable the image text to be edited with Foxit PDF Editor. With Searchable Image Text or Editable Text selected, you can set a DPI value for the output in the Downsample To item to compress images in the document and reduce the file size during the OCR process.
    • Searchable Text Image/Searchable Image Text (original image): During the OCR process, Foxit PDF Editor analyzes the image text and substitutes words/characters that closely approximates the image text. The substitute words/characters will be placed on an invisible layer of text in the PDF, which makes the image text selectable and searchable. If the substitution is uncertain, the text will be marked as OCR suspects which need to be corrected manually.
    • Editable Text: During the OCR process, Foxit PDF Editor compares the shape of the image text to the approximate fonts installed on your system, and turns the image text into editable text.
  • Check Find All Suspects (Show all OCR results that may need to be changed.) option if you want the OCR suspects to be displayed for you to check and correct after the recognition.
    Tip: This option is available when you recognize the text in the current PDF file. If you recognize text in multiple files, please open the recognized PDF files with Foxit PDF Editor, and choose Convert in the Ribbon > Convert > Suspect Results to find the suspects. For more information, please refer to “Find and Correct OCR Suspects”.
  • Click OK to start text recognition.

• (Optional) If you checked Find All Suspect (Show all OCR results that may need to be changed.) option, the OCR suspects will be enclosed in red boxes for you to check and correct after the recognition completes. Follow the steps in Find and Correct OCR Suspects to check and correct the suspects.

Find and Correct OCR Suspects

After recognizing image-based or scanned text in the PDF file, you can pick out and correct the text or characters that are uncertain.

• Click Convert in the Ribbon > Convert > Suspect Results, and choose one of the following options:
  • First Suspect: Show the first suspect in the Find OCR Suspects dialog box, and enclose all the OCR suspects in red boxes in the document.
  • All Suspects: Show all the suspects in the OCR Suspects dialog box, and enclose all the OCR suspects in red boxes in the document.  
• Both the original document text and OCR text will be displayed in the pop-up dialog box. You can do the following:
  • If you select the First Suspect option, do the following:
    • By default, the suspect results are based on the Search Document. You can also select Search Page to find suspects on the current page and redo this step.
    • If necessary, edit the text in the OCR text box.
    • If some content that is originally not text is incorrectly identified, click Not Text.
    • Click Accept and Find to accept the suspect and find the next one.
    • Click Find Next to find the next suspect.
  • If you select the All Suspects option, do the following:
    • Select the result item that need to be modified, and edit the text in the OCR text box.
    • Select one or more result items, and click Accept to accept the suspect(s). Or, if some content that is originally not text is incorrectly identified, click Not Text.
• Upon completion, click Close to close the dialog box.