# pdftotext(1) - man - phpman > **TLDR:** Convert PDF files to plain text format. > - Convert `filename.pdf` to plain text and print it to `stdout`: `pdftotext {{filename.pdf}} -` - Convert `filename.pdf` to plain text and save it as `filename.txt`: `pdftotext {{filename.pdf}}` - Convert `filename.pdf` to plain text and preserve the layout: `pdftotext -layout {{filename.pdf}}` - Convert `input.pdf` to plain text and save it as `output.txt`: `pdftotext {{input.pdf}} {{output.txt}}` - Convert pages 2, 3, and 4 of `input.pdf` to plain text and save them as `output.txt`: `pdftotext -f {{2}} -l {{4}} {{input.pdf}} {{output.txt}}` *Source: tldr-pages* --- [pdftotext(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdftotext/1/markdown) General Commands Manual [pdftotext(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdftotext/1/markdown) ## NAME pdftotext - Portable Document Format (PDF) to text converter (version 3.03) ## SYNOPSIS **pdftotext** [options] [_PDF-file_ [_text-file_]] ## DESCRIPTION **Pdftotext** converts Portable Document Format (PDF) files to plain text. Pdftotext reads the PDF file, _PDF-file_, and writes a text file, _text-file_. If _text-file_ is not specified, pdftotext converts _file.pdf_ to _file.txt_. If _text-file_ is ´-', the text is sent to stdout. If _PDF-file_ is ´-', it reads the PDF file from stdin. ## OPTIONS ### -f Specifies the first page to convert. ### -l Specifies the last page to convert. ### -r Specifies the resolution, in DPI. The default is 72 DPI. ### -x Specifies the x-coordinate of the crop area top left corner ### -y Specifies the y-coordinate of the crop area top left corner ### -W Specifies the width of crop area in pixels (default is 0) ### -H Specifies the height of crop area in pixels (default is 0) ### -layout Maintain (as best as possible) the original physical layout of the text. The default is to ´undo' physical layout (columns, hyphenation, etc.) and output the text in read‐ ing order. ### -fixed Assume fixed-pitch (or tabular) text, with the specified character width (in points). This forces physical layout mode. ### -raw formatting, etc. Use of raw mode is no longer recommended. ### -nodiag Discard diagonal text (i.e., text that is not close to one of the 0, 90, 180, or 270 degree axes). This is useful for skipping watermarks drawn on body text. ### -htmlmeta Generate a simple HTML file, including the meta information. This simply wraps the text in 
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and prepends the meta headers. ### -bbox ### -bbox-layout Generate an XHTML file containing bounding box information for each block, line, and word in the file. ### -cropbox Use the crop box rather than the media box with -bbox and -bbox-layout. ### -colspacing Specifies how much spacing we allow after a word before considering adjacent text to be a new column, measured as a fraction of the font size. Current default is 0.7, old releases had a 0.3 default. ### -enc Sets the encoding to use for text output. This defaults to "UTF-8". ### -listenc Lists the available encodings ### -eol Sets the end-of-line convention to use for text output. ### -nopgbrk Don't insert page breaks (form feed characters) between pages. ### -opw Specify the owner password for the PDF file. Providing this will bypass all security restrictions. ### -upw Specify the user password for the PDF file. ### -q ### -v ### -h -help --help ## BUGS Some PDF files contain fonts whose encodings have been mangled beyond recognition. There is no way (short of OCR) to extract text from these files. ## EXIT CODES The Xpdf tools use the following exit codes: 0 No error. 1 Error opening a PDF file. 2 Error opening an output file. 3 Error related to PDF permissions. 99 Other error. ## AUTHOR The pdftotext software and documentation are copyright 1996-2011 Glyph & Cog, LLC. ## SEE ALSO [**pdfdetach**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdfdetach/1/markdown), [**pdffonts**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdffonts/1/markdown), [**pdfimages**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdfimages/1/markdown), [**pdfinfo**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdfinfo/1/markdown), [**pdftocairo**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdftocairo/1/markdown), [**pdftohtml**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdftohtml/1/markdown), [**pdftoppm**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdftoppm/1/markdown), [**pdftops**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdftops/1/markdown), [**pdfseparate**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdfseparate/1/markdown), [**pdfsig**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdfsig/1/markdown), [**pdfunite**(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdfunite/1/markdown) 15 August 2011 [pdftotext(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/pdftotext/1/markdown)