Free PDF compressor: compress PDF files for email and upload limits in three levels — light, balanced, strong. Reduce PDF size while text stays crisp and searchable.
The same reliable Vocce pipeline, focused on this job. Start free, then plans from $9.90/mo when you need more.
PDFs get big for reasons that have nothing to do with what you're actually sharing: photos embedded at print resolution for a document read on screens, scanner defaults from 2009, fonts embedded three times over. Compressing a PDF re-encodes those images at sensible resolution and quality, strips redundant data, and rebuilds the file — same pages, same layout, dramatically fewer megabytes.
Vocce gives you three levels because "compress" means different things on different days. Light keeps images near-original and mostly clears structural waste — for documents that still face a designer or printer. Balanced, the default, targets comfortable on-screen reading: image-heavy decks and scans typically drop 50–80%. Strong is for hard limits — the 10MB portal, the 25MB inbox — accepting visible image softness in exchange for the smallest possible file.
The one thing that never degrades is text. Words in a PDF are vector data — compression re-encodes the pictures around them, so contracts stay crisp and searchable at every level. What changes is photographs and scans; what doesn't is anything you'd read.
Processing runs on Vocce's own servers with the same rules as every other tool here: files are deleted on a short schedule after processing, nothing is used for training, and a failed job costs nothing. Upload, pick a level, download — no signup, no watermark pages appended to your document.
Light, balanced, strong — real presets with different image resolution/quality targets, not one mystery slider.
Vector text and layout pass through untouched at every level — only embedded images are re-encoded.
Scanner-default PDFs are the most over-sized files in circulation, and where 80–90% reductions are routine.
Selectable, searchable text stays selectable and searchable — compression doesn't rasterize your document.
Both numbers shown when the job finishes, so you know exactly what the level bought you.
Beyond images: duplicate resources, unused objects, and structural waste are cleaned in the rebuild.
Your document comes back as your document — nothing appended, nothing stamped.
Uploads and outputs are deleted on a short rolling schedule after processing — see the privacy policy.
Compress PDFs free, no signup. Heavy batch use is covered by the same plans as the rest of Vocce.
Portfolio and CV under the portal's 5–10MB ceiling without exporting everything again from scratch.
Scanned exhibits and signed contracts meet court and government upload limits — text still searchable.
The 40MB report clears a 25MB inbox limit at balanced, usually with room to spare.
Thesis PDFs with figures shrink to journal and LMS limits without touching the LaTeX.
Photo-heavy inspection reports become sendable instead of "see WeTransfer link".
Years of scanned records take a fraction of the storage at light or balanced with no readability loss.
The bulk of most PDFs is embedded images stored at unnecessarily high resolution and quality. Compression re-encodes those images to fit the level you choose, strips redundant objects, and rebuilds the file — pages and layout unchanged.
No. Text in PDFs is vector data and passes through untouched at every level. Only embedded images (photos, scans, figures) are re-encoded. The exception: scanned documents where the "text" is itself a photo of a page — strong compression can soften those, which is why light and balanced exist.
Depends on what's inside. Image-heavy decks and scans: commonly 50–80% at balanced, more at strong. Text-only PDFs are already small and shrink modestly. You see before/after sizes when the job finishes.
Balanced, unless you have a reason: light when the document still faces print or design work, strong when you must clear a hard limit like a 10MB portal.
Yes — selectable, searchable text remains so at every level. Compression never rasterizes your document into pictures of pages.
Files up to the standard upload cap (50MB in the browser tool) with hundreds of pages process fine. Larger batches are what the API and paid plans are for.
Processing happens on Vocce's own servers — not passed to third-party converters. Files are deleted on a short rolling schedule after processing and never used for training. Details in the privacy policy.
Never. No watermarks, no appended pages, no "compressed by" stamps — the document stays entirely yours.
Yes — compress PDFs free with no signup. If it becomes a daily workflow, plans from $9.90/month cover the whole toolset.