PDF to Word Downloads

[Al Launier]

On occasion I've downloaded PDF files that couldn't be printed, or even copy/paste into Word. Frustrating.

I've found a number of free software that converts PDF to Word, in my case W8.1/Word 2007, but they are usually limited as to how many conversions can be done, i.e, 5-7 or first require a commitment for a subscription before performing a limited number of conversions in which one must leave their credit card number to do so (won't do). Plus they can't be text edited.

Have any of you found some reasonably good PDF to Word downloads that are free, or reasonably priced?

[Jim Tobias]

Al,
Don't know which version of Word you have but I have Word through Office 365 and it will directly convert a PDF to a Word document that can be edited.
I know this may not help buy worth looking at if you do a fair amount of converting.

Jim

[William Adams]

PDFcreator is free and opensource and works well:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/

[Chris Schoenthal]

When creating a PDF, there is a way to lock it so nothing can be done. Perhaps you have occasionally run into those.
Depending on the content of the PDF, you also might try an OCR (Optical Character Recognition) program.
Those will usually make out the words in a document and you can paste that into a Word document.

Chris

[Al Launier]

Thank you Jim, William & Chris. I'll look into these.

[Al Launier]

PDFcreator is free and opensource and works well:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/

Thank you William. Went there & it has been changed to www.pdfforg.org. So far so good!

[Mark Bolton]

Im with Jim. Why dont you just open the PDF in word directly? How old is your version of Word?

[Al Launier]

I have MS Word 2007. I tried to open with this & all I get is a sheet of programming language.

[John K Jordan]

Thank you William. Went there & it has been changed to www.pdfforg.org. So far so good!

I'm naturally suspicious of a web page that says "Buy this domain" at the top and states any links on the page are put there by some unknown or unaffiliated 3rd party. The misspelling of pdfforge.org as pdfforg.org is also troubling.

I might trust this route more: https://www.pdfforge.org/

[Bill Carey]

I,ve been using Foxit Phantom PDF for years. Great software. It can convert a pdf to word, excel or powerpoint. I think I paid 49 bucks for it.

[John K Jordan]

I,ve been using Foxit Phantom PDF for years. Great software. It can convert a pdf to word, excel or powerpoint. I think I paid 49 bucks for it.

Looks like it's $129 now.

[Bill Carey]

Looks like it's $129 now.

Yikes. I guess a combination of time and a bad memory will do that.

[Jim Tobias]

This is a good deal if you use it on multiple devices and also up to 6 family members.
1 month free trial.
No affiliation.... these days I like software that makes using devices faster and simpler.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/office-365-home/cfq7ttc0k5dm?activetab=pivot%3ao
Jim

[roger wiegand]

The full version of Acrobat (not Acrobat Reader) works very well, but it is not cheap unless you need the whole Adobe CS for other reasons. When I run into a locked PDF I just scan it and run OCR (I use Acrobat, but there are many choices). Usually that is fast and good.

[Mike Henderson]

The full version of Acrobat (not Acrobat Reader) works very well, but it is not cheap unless you need the whole Adobe CS for other reasons. When I run into a locked PDF I just scan it and run OCR (I use Acrobat, but there are many choices). Usually that is fast and good.

I have Acrobat XI and looked to see if there was a newer version. All they offer now is a subscription for Acrobat Pro and it was expensive. I don't remember exactly but I think it was something like $15/mo. That's $180/year and that's more than I paid for a lifetime license for Acrobat Pro XI. If it ever gets to the point where Acrobat XI doesn't work any more, I'll certainly go with something other than the subscription for Acrobat.

Also, the lock on PDF documents is very weak and you can find programs what will unlock them - I have one and I remember it was not expensive.

Mike

[Curt Harms]

LibreOffice Draw takes care of my PDF editing needs. PDFs were not intended to be edited AFAIK, they were intended to display the same regardless of device, a subset of PostScript I've read.

[John K Jordan]

I,ve been using Foxit Phantom PDF for years. Great software. It can convert a pdf to word, excel or powerpoint. I think I paid 49 bucks for it.

Bill, are the layout and editing features of Foxit good? For example, it appears from the manual that you can open a blank document, type in text, and add photos and move them around. When you size and place an photo can the text automatically wrap around the photo as it does with Word, Pagemaker, or one of the other document creation programs?

This is an example of the type of layout I do:

402529

I currently use Word to create documentation from scratch then convert to PDF. The method I use not is a pain so I'd like to find a better way, all in one program if possible. I don't mind paying for the software but I don't do this often enough to justify paying for a subscription.

JKJ

[Mike Henderson]

LibreOffice Draw takes care of my PDF editing needs. PDFs were not intended to be edited AFAIK, they were intended to display the same regardless of device, a subset of PostScript I've read.

You're right. But sometimes a colleague will send you a document in pdf, maybe because it was created with a program that you don't have. Being able to edit or make notes on the pdf is valuable.

Mike

[Curt Harms]

You're right. But sometimes a colleague will send you a document in pdf, maybe because it was created with a program that you don't have. Being able to edit or make notes on the pdf is valuable.

Mike

LibreOffice draw does at least limited editing. I'm not sure how saving and opening in something other than LibreOffice would work though, never tried it. IIRC, PDFs edited in LibreOffice draw are saved a a hybrid PDF/ODT file. Most times I've edited a PDF in LibreOffice Draw I've wound up editing, printing, signing and either emailing or faxing the final form.