Making a new blank PDF in PDF by Zaweba

Starting from nothing is sometimes exactly what you need. A blank page to sketch on with the pen, a set of empty sheets to stamp and send, a page to drop a picture onto or a few spare pages to add to the end of another document. PDF by Zaweba makes one in a couple of clicks.

Choose File > New > Blank PDF, or press Ctrl+N. Pick the paper size from A4, A5, A3, Letter, Legal or Tabloid, choose which way round you want it, and say how many pages. The new document opens in its own tab, not yet saved, ready for you to work on.

Choosing size and orientation

Match the size to where the document will end up. If it will be printed in the UK or Europe, A4 is the usual choice, with A5 for booklets and notes and A3 for posters and large plans. Letter, Legal and Tabloid are the North American sizes, worth choosing if you are sending to someone who will print there.

Orientation is the other choice. Upright pages suit letters, forms and notes. Turned on their side, they suit wide tables, timelines and anything you want to show on a screen, because monitors are wider than they are tall.

The number of pages can be whatever you need. A single page is fine for a quick note; a dozen give you room for a whole set of hand-drawn diagrams.

What you can do with a blank PDF

The commenting tools work on a blank page just as they do on any other. Type on the page, add a text box, draw shapes, lines and arrows, sketch with the freehand pen, or put down a stamp. A blank PDF becomes a quick whiteboard for a diagram you want to send as a file.

You can also add a picture to the page as a comment, which is handy for a simple cover sheet with a logo, or for putting a photo and a few notes together.

Blank pages are useful in combining too. Make a single blank page and add it between documents in File > Combine files, for example to start each section on a fresh sheet when printing two-sided.

Saving it

The new document is in a tab but not on disk. Save it when you are ready, and choose a clear name and folder. Until then, closing the tab means losing it, so if you have spent a while drawing or annotating, save early.

How it fits with the other ways of making PDFs

A blank PDF is one of several starting points in File > New. If you already have content, the other routes are usually quicker: make a PDF from pictures, from a text or Markdown file, from the clipboard, from a screen capture or from a web page. Reach for the blank option when you are going to create the content inside the app, or when you need empty pages to work with.

It also pairs with page boxes. If you need a size that is not on the list, start with the nearest one and set the page boxes or change the page size afterwards.

Small mistakes to avoid

Picking the wrong paper size is the commonest. It is easy to start with A4 out of habit when the document is going to someone who prints on Letter. Decide first.

Choosing too few pages is the other. It is simple to make another blank document and combine them, but asking for the right number at the start saves a step.

Whether you need a quick sketch pad or empty pages to build on, a blank PDF in PDF by Zaweba takes seconds, works offline and needs no account.