Scanners and phone scanning apps often save every page as a full-resolution colour photo — 2 to 5 MB a page, even for plain text. This page is set up for scans: the Recommended level re-saves each page at a sensible resolution, and Convert to black & white removes colour you don't need, which often halves the size again.
Tips for the best result
- Text scans stay readable down to quite small sizes — try Extreme if Recommended isn't enough.
- Keep colour for photos, stamps and signatures in blue ink.
- Next time, set your scanner to 200–300 DPI and grayscale for documents.
How to compress scanned PDF
- Select or drop your PDF (you can add several).
- Pick a compression level — or choose Exact size and type the limit, e.g. 200 KB.
- Click Compress PDF.
- Download the smaller PDF. We show you exactly how much space you saved.
Want more options? The full Compress PDF tool has every setting.
Frequently asked questions
Why are scanned PDFs so big?
Each page is stored as a photo, often in colour and at a higher resolution than you need for reading or uploading.
How small can a scanned PDF get?
A typical text page compresses well below 100 KB with black & white turned on. For an exact limit, use Exact size.
Can I make the scan searchable?
Not here — compression doesn't add text recognition (OCR). The compressed file looks the same as the scan, just smaller.
How do I reduce a PDF to 200 KB (or 100 KB)?
Add your PDF, choose "Exact size (KB / MB)", type 200 (or 100) and click Compress PDF. The tool tries different quality settings and gives you the best-looking version that fits under your limit.
Step-by-step guide: How to reduce PDF size for online forms (100 KB, 200 KB and more)
Read the guide