How to Crop a PDF Online — Free, Margin Control, No Watermark

Scanned PDFs from book pages have huge blank margins eating half the page. Slide decks exported from PowerPoint have presenter notes wasting the bottom third. Both call for cropping — trimming the chrome so the content fills the page. Takes about fifteen seconds.

When you actually need Crop PDF

Book scans with huge margins, decks with presenter notes you don't want, receipts with whitespace dominating the page, contracts that came from a wider page size and need to fit a different sheet.

How to crop pdf, step by step

Open the tool

Go to convertpdfgo.com/crop. No account, no email, no installation.

Drop the PDF in

Drag the file onto the upload area or click to pick. Files up to 30 MB go through without a queue. Encrypted in transit (TLS 1.3), encrypted at rest, deleted within one hour.

Configure your run

Set the four margins in PDF points (1 pt = 1/72 inch).

Download

The output is a clean PDF — open in any reader.

Common problems and how to avoid them

Margins are wrong unit

We use PDF points (1 pt = 1/72 inch). 72 points = 1 inch = 25.4 mm. Type 36 to remove half an inch from each side.

Cropped page is empty

You set margins larger than the actual content area. Reduce the margins or check the original page dimensions.

Wanted to crop one page differently

Run two passes — one for the odd page, one for the rest. Merge the results.

A short word on privacy

Three things to know. One: files go over TLS 1.3. Two: files are encrypted at rest while we process them, then deleted automatically within one hour. Three: we don't look at your files or train on them.

How we compare to other free tools

Feature	convertpdfgo	Smallpdf	iLovePDF
Sign-up	None	After 2/day	Optional
Watermark	None	None	None
Auto-delete	1 hour	Vague	2 hours

Frequently asked questions

Will it cut content or just whitespace?

Whatever you set. If your margins fall inside the content, content gets cut. We don't auto-detect — you set the box.

Can I crop each page differently?

Not in one job. Run separate passes for pages with different margins, then merge the outputs.

Are my files private?

Files are encrypted in transit (TLS 1.3) and at rest, then auto-deleted within one hour.

Will it work on protected PDFs?

Not directly — unlock the PDF first with our Unlock PDF tool if you know the password.

Is there a usage limit?

No. Free, no daily cap, no sign-up wall, no watermark.

How long does it take?

About 1-3 seconds for most files. Larger or image-heavy PDFs can take up to 30 seconds.

What's the file size limit?

30 MB as a guest, 50 MB when signed in.

What to do next

Now you can Rotate PDF, Merge PDF, or Compress PDF. All free.

Or browse our full list of 49 free PDF tools.