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How to Convert a PDF to JPG or PNG Images

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You’ve got a PDF. The other side needs images. Maybe an old form upload that only accepts JPGs. Maybe a social media post where you want each page as its own slide. Maybe a website that only embeds images, not PDFs. Maybe a chat app that previews images but treats PDFs as cold attachments.

You need each PDF page as a separate image file. Here’s how.

The fastest way: convert in your browser

Use the PDF to Images converter. Drop in your PDF, pick the output format and quality, click convert. You get a zip of images — one per page — that downloads to your computer.

The flow:

  1. Open the PDF to Images
  2. Drag in your PDF
  3. Choose output format: JPG (smaller files) or PNG (better quality, larger)
  4. Pick a DPI (resolution per inch — see below for guidance)
  5. Click convert
  6. Download the zip containing one image per page

For a typical 10-page PDF at 150 DPI, conversion takes a few seconds and produces a zip of ~1-3 MB of JPGs.

What DPI should I pick?

This is the most important choice. DPI (“dots per inch”) sets the resolution at which each PDF page gets rendered to an image. The right setting depends on what you’ll do with the images:

  • 72 DPI — screen-only viewing. Page comes out at roughly the size it shows in a PDF reader. Files are tiny but you can’t zoom in much. Fine for thumbnails.
  • 150 DPI — good default for general use. Pages are sharp enough to read on most screens, files stay reasonable. Use this when you’re not sure.
  • 300 DPI — print quality. Page renders at the resolution a printer expects for sharp output. Files are 4× the size of 150 DPI. Use when the images will be printed or zoomed into.
  • 600 DPI — archival/professional. Massive files. Use only when you specifically need extreme zoom-in detail (e.g., capturing fine print or detailed diagrams for forensic review).

Most cases: pick 150 DPI. If the images need to be printed, pick 300 DPI. Anything higher is wasted unless you have a specific reason.

JPG vs PNG for PDF pages

JPG files are smaller, PNG files are larger but lossless. For PDF pages specifically:

Choose JPG when:

  • The PDF pages are mostly text or photos
  • File size matters (you’re uploading several, or attaching to email)
  • The destination doesn’t need pixel-perfect output

Choose PNG when:

  • The PDF pages have charts, diagrams, or technical drawings (JPG’s compression makes thin lines fuzzy)
  • The destination requires lossless (printing, design work)
  • You’ll edit the images further (every JPG re-save degrades quality slightly)

For a PDF of a scanned letter or a typical business document, JPG is fine and gives you smaller files. For a PDF containing schematics, blueprints, or anything with crisp lines and high-contrast edges, use PNG.

Why people convert PDF to images

A few common use cases:

Posting pages on social media or forums. Most platforms accept image uploads but treat PDFs as attached files that require download. Converting to images means each page shows inline as a swipeable carousel.

Uploading to forms that only accept images. Lots of old government forms, application portals, and legacy systems only accept JPG/PNG. Converting your PDF lets you upload it as if it were photos.

Feeding into an OCR pipeline. Some OCR tools work better on images than PDFs (different parsing). For finicky cases, converting PDF to images first and OCR’ing each image gives better results than OCR-ing the PDF directly. Our PDF OCR tool handles PDFs natively so this workaround isn’t usually needed.

Inserting pages into Word, PowerPoint, or other documents. These programs handle pasted images cleanly but handle pasted PDF pages poorly. Convert to images and insert as images.

Extracting a single illustration or chart. A PDF page might contain a chart you want to use elsewhere. Convert the whole PDF to images, crop the page image to just the chart with the Image Cropper, and use the result.

Preparing pages for individual emails or messages. Sometimes you need to send just page 5 to someone. Easier to convert the PDF to images and send page 5 as a JPG than to ask the recipient to “scroll to page 5.”

What about the reverse — combining images back into a PDF?

If you have a bunch of images and want them back in a single PDF (one image per page), use Images to PDF (works for PNGs too). The whole round-trip works:

This is the workflow when you want to “edit” a PDF that doesn’t have selectable text — turn it into images, edit the images (annotate, crop, modify), then rebuild a PDF from the modified images.

Compressing the output

Even at 150 DPI, a 50-page PDF can produce 30-100 MB of images. If you need to send the images somewhere with size limits:

  1. Convert PDF → images
  2. Run all the images through the Image Compressor at quality 0.85
  3. Result is typically 60-80% smaller with no visible quality loss

For situations where you’ll re-bundle as PDF anyway, you can also just compress the original PDF first with the PDF Compressor — that may make the conversion step unnecessary.

Limits

The browser-based conversion handles PDFs up to a few hundred pages at typical DPIs. Beyond that, memory becomes a constraint. Approximate sizing:

  • 100-page PDF at 150 DPI: comfortable, takes ~20 seconds
  • 500-page PDF at 150 DPI: works but slow, may struggle on lower-memory machines
  • 1000-page PDF at 150 DPI: typically too much for a browser

For PDFs over ~500 pages, split first with the PDF Splitter, convert each piece, then bundle the resulting images however you need.

For 99% of “I have a PDF, I need images” cases, the browser conversion handles it without issue.

Privacy

The conversion runs entirely in your browser:

  • The PDF is parsed in JavaScript using pdf.js
  • Each page is rendered to a canvas at the requested DPI
  • The canvas is exported as JPG or PNG
  • The output zip is built in browser memory and offered as a download

Nothing touches a server. For sensitive PDFs (medical records, legal documents, financial statements), this means no copy of your file exists anywhere outside your machine.

TL;DR

  • PDF → images → PDF to Images
  • 150 DPI for screen, 300 DPI for print
  • JPG for text/photos, PNG for charts/diagrams
  • Result is a zip with one image per page
  • Compress the output with Image Compressor if file size matters
  • Pair with Images to PDF for round-trip image editing of a PDF

Tools that solve this directly

No signup, runs in your browser, nothing uploaded.

PDF to ImagesExtract each page of a PDF as a JPG or PNG. Single image for 1-page PDFs, ZIP for multi-page.Image CompressorShrink JPG, PNG, or WebP photos to fit email, upload, or storage limits — entirely in your browser.Merge PDFsCombine multiple PDFs into one — entirely in your browser, files never uploaded.PDF OCR — Scanned PDF to TextExtract text from scanned or image-only PDFs using Tesseract OCR. Each page is rendered and recognized in your browser — the PDF never leaves your device. Editable output, copy to clipboard or download as .txt.