You can always separate them again after locking the PDF from editing-just head over to our Split PDF tool, which you’ll find on our homepage. However, a way around this would be to merge your PDF into one document before going through the steps above. Both tools to protect PDFs are free to use and are accessible online or through our desktop and mobile apps, for you to use anywhere, anytime.īoth the PDF to JPG and the password protect tool don’t allow you to process multiple files at the same time as of right now. Click “Encrypt PDF” to add the password to the PDF.įor fully protected PDF security, we’d recommend placing a password and locking the PDF file from editing at the same time.Drag and drop your PDF into the toolbox.Permission passwords created with our Protect tool are heavily encrypted, so only those with the password can view the document. If you’re worried about others editing your file, you can take it a step further and encrypt your PDF document with a password. If you want to switch it back to PDF after making your edits, you can simply go back and follow the instructions above again.
To do this, you just have to go to our PDF Converter and save the PDF file into one of the three editable formats: Word, PPT, or Excel. Smallpdf has Optical Character Recognition (OCR) to extract text from PDF files into editable format again. If you’re happy with the file in JPG format, you can skip the last step and download the file instead of clicking “JPG to PDF.” Either way, the new document will be read-only by the time you save it.
Locking your PDF is very useful when you want to share classified information that can’t be manipulated by other people or if you want to make sure no one can claim your creative work as their own-such as a photograph of a cool dog in sunglasses. The second step changes it back to PDF format. To summarize, this process first takes the PDF and converts it into an image file, which not only prevents editing but also protects the PDF from copying.