Flatten PDF
Turn a PDF form's fill-in fields into fixed page content.
- Free, no sign-up
- Files stay on your device
- PDF / up to 50 MB
Step by step
How to flatten a PDF form
Step 1: Drop a filled-in PDF form on the box above, or select Choose file.
Step 2: Select Flatten PDF.
Step 3: Check the result, then select Download PDF.
What flattening does
A PDF form keeps its answers in fields that stay editable, and some readers draw them differently or not at all when printing. Flattening draws every field's current content onto the page itself and removes the fields, so what you see is what everyone gets and nobody can change the answers by typing into them.
It is the usual last step before sending a completed form. To fill the form in first, use PDF forms, which can also flatten when it saves.
When to flatten
Flatten a form when it is complete and you are sending it to someone who should read it, not change it: an application, an invoice or a signed agreement. It also fixes forms that look blank or different in a phone viewer or a printer driver, because the answers become ordinary page content that every reader draws the same way.
What it does not do
Only form fields are flattened. Comments, highlights, stamps and other markup are kept as they are, not merged into the page. Flattening is not security: the text of the page can still be selected, and a flattened form can still be edited with a PDF editor. To remove content for good, use Redact PDF.
A PDF without form fields, such as a scanned form, has nothing to flatten and you are told so.
Private
The form is processed inside your browser tab. Nothing is uploaded.