How to extract pages from a PDF

To pull certain pages out of a PDF, choose them in the thumbnails of PDF by Zaweba and use Pages > Extract. The pages can open in a new tab as a document of their own, or be saved as separate files. If you want them taken out of the original as well, there's an option to delete them from it as you extract.

It's the job you need when someone asks for "just the signed page", or when one section of a long report is all that's relevant to a colleague.

Choosing the pages

The thumbnails panel down the side of the window shows every page. Press F4 if it's hidden. Click a thumbnail to choose it, Ctrl+click to add more pages one by one, and Shift+click to take a run of pages from the last one you chose.

For bigger selections, Pages > Select pages is quicker. Type a list of pages, or pick odd pages, even pages, landscape pages or portrait pages. Choosing all the landscape pages, for example, is a fast way to pull the wide tables or drawings out of a report.

Extracting them

With the pages chosen, use Pages > Extract. Decide where they should go.

Opening them in a new tab gives you a fresh document holding just those pages. It's not yet saved, so you can look it over, add or remove a page, and then save it under a new name. This is the usual choice when you want one smaller PDF to send.

Saving them as separate files writes each page as a file of its own. That suits jobs like splitting a set of certificates or payslips so each can go to a different person.

The option to delete the pages from the original turns extract into a move. Use it when you're dividing a document into two, say the appendix from the main report. Remember to save the original afterwards if you want that change kept, and if you change your mind, Ctrl+Z undoes it.

Extract, split or copy

PDF by Zaweba has a few ways of getting pages from one place to another, and each suits a different job.

Extract is for a selection: these pages, out, as a new document or as files.

Split is for cutting the whole document into parts by a rule, every so many pages, at bookmarks, before chosen pages, or by size.

Copying pages is for moving them between open documents. In the thumbnails, Ctrl+C copies the chosen pages and Ctrl+V pastes them, including into another open tab. That's the quickest way to take a page from one PDF and drop it into another you're already working on.

When pages won't extract

Some PDFs are set up by their owners to forbid changes to pages. PDF by Zaweba respects that and tells you so, rather than leaving you wondering why nothing happened. If the document is yours and has a password, you'll need it to change those permissions.

Check the extracted file before sending it, too. Links that pointed to pages you left behind have nowhere to go, and a page numbered 47 may now be page 1, which can confuse a reader if it refers to other pages.

PDF by Zaweba is free software for Windows. It works offline with no account, so the pages you pull out of private documents never leave your PC.