PSA: Use Microsoft Word to create & edit PDFs!

PSA! You no longer need a professional PDF editing program such as Adobe Acrobat to create & edit the majority of PDF files!

It has come to my attention that folks may not know about these features in Microsoft Word. The latest couple of versions of Microsoft Word have built in features to convert and create PDF files.

To open a PDF and convert it to an editable Word document, simply open the PDF file from inside Word.

1. Open Microsoft Word
2. Click the Open Other Documents link on the bottom left of the screen
3. Browse to the folder location of the PDF file and select it
4. Click the Open button
5. Word will present you with a message that it will now try to convert the PDF file to an editable Word document. Depending on the size of the file, this may take a while. Select OK

That’s it! Word should create a new Word document that looks identical (or really close) to the PDF document. Depending on the PDF, it may treat text as text or as a picture – it depends on how the PDF was created and if the fonts are embedded in the document or not. In other words, your mileage may vary but in general this works quite well.

Once you’ve modified your Word document, you can save it directly from Word to a PDF document.

1. Click on the File tab
2. Select Save As from the menu on the left
3. Browse to where you want to save the file
4. Select PDF (*.pdf) from the Save as type drop down
5. Click the Save button