You've got a PDF full of content you need in Markdown. Maybe it's documentation you want to put on GitHub. Maybe it's a report you need to edit in a static site generator. Whatever the reason, here's how to convert PDF to Markdown cleanly.

TL;DR

  • Use TinyUtils Document Converter to convert PDF to Markdown.
  • Works best with text-based PDFs (not scanned images).
  • Preserves headings, lists, tables, and basic formatting.
  • Complex layouts may need manual cleanup.

Reality check: PDFs aren’t “documents” in the way you think

A PDF is closer to a printout than a Word file. It often doesn’t store “this is a heading” or “this is a list” — it stores where to draw glyphs on a page. Converting to Markdown is basically asking a tool to reconstruct structure from that layout.

Two quick sanity checks before you convert:

  • Can you select text? If you can’t highlight text, it’s probably a scan and you need OCR first.
  • Is it one column? Multi‑column PDFs (newsletters, brochures) are where reading order gets weird.

Why convert PDF to Markdown?

  • Version control — Markdown plays nice with Git
  • Static sites — Jekyll, Hugo, Astro all use Markdown
  • Documentation — README files, wikis, docs-as-code
  • Editing — Markdown is easier to edit than PDF
  • Portability — Plain text works everywhere

How to convert PDF to Markdown

  1. Open TinyUtils Document Converter.
  2. Upload your PDF file.
  3. Select Markdown as output format.
  4. Click convert.
  5. Download your Markdown file.

If you can, get the source file

This sounds obvious, but it saves hours: if the PDF was generated from Word, Google Docs, or Markdown in the first place, ask for that source file. Converting a PDF is always a reconstruction problem. Converting from the original source is usually cleaner, faster, and less “why is this table cursed?”

What converts well

  • Headings — H1, H2, H3 structure preserved
  • Paragraphs — Text flows correctly
  • Lists — Bullets and numbered lists
  • Bold/Italic — Basic formatting
  • Links — Hyperlinks preserved
  • Tables — Simple tables (complex ones may need cleanup)
  • Code blocks — If formatted as monospace

What doesn't convert perfectly

  • Multi-column layouts — May merge incorrectly
  • Scanned PDFs — No OCR; you get nothing
  • Complex tables — Merged cells, nested tables
  • Footnotes — May appear inline or at the end
  • Images — Extracted separately, linked in Markdown

What about scanned PDFs?

If your PDF is a scanned document (images of pages, not selectable text), you need OCR (Optical Character Recognition) first. TinyUtils focuses on text-based PDFs. For scanned documents, try Adobe Acrobat's OCR or Google Drive's built-in OCR.

Tips for better results

  • Start with good PDFs — Well-structured PDFs convert cleanly
  • Check the output — Always review converted Markdown
  • Fix headers manually — Sometimes H2 becomes H3
  • Clean up tables — Markdown tables are finicky
  • Watch for repeated headers/footers — PDFs love stamping the same line on every page

A couple of “quick wins” that fix a lot of converted PDFs:

  • Hard line breaks: If paragraphs look like one sentence per line, replace line breaks between lowercase letters with a space.
  • Hyphenation: If you see words like docu-\nment, join them back together.

Common cleanup patterns (the boring stuff that matters)

PDFs often inject things that aren’t “content” but still get converted:

  • Page numbers: you’ll see stray 12 / 13 lines in the middle of paragraphs.
  • Running headers: document title repeated on every page.
  • Line-wrapped URLs: a long link breaks across lines and stops being clickable.

If you’re converting a long report, it’s often faster to fix these with a couple targeted find/replace passes than to “hand edit” every page.

Other output options

Don't need Markdown specifically? TinyUtils can also convert PDF to:

  • Word (DOCX) — For editing in Microsoft Word
  • HTML — For web publishing
  • Plain text — Just the text, no formatting

FAQ

Does this work with password-protected PDFs?

No. You'll need to unlock the PDF first using the password.

What Markdown flavor is output?

A GitHub‑ish flavor (GFM‑style) is the usual target, because it’s what most tools accept. If you rely on specific extensions (task lists, special callouts), scan the output and adjust.

Can I convert multiple PDFs at once?

Yes! Upload multiple files and convert them in batch.

Next steps

Ready to convert? Open TinyUtils Document Converter, upload your PDF, and get clean Markdown in seconds.