3 Simple Ways to Remove Password from PDF Files for Free

a collection of PDF related tricks and tutorials such as remove password from PDF file, decrypt PDF, etc.

We deal with a lot of password-protected PDF files every day – from credit card statements to even broadband bills. That additional security is definitely good but it can also be a hindrance to keep track of the password. While it’s ok to enter passwords for PDF files that we rarely use, the situation changes as we use the file more frequently. In such cases, it’s convenient to remove password protection from a PDF file by decrypting it. PDF decryption is very easy but requires specialized software to do that. In this tutorial, you will see how to remove password from PDF file in three distinct methods.

Remove PDF password using Chrome or any other browser

You will be quite surprised to know that you can actually use your web browser as PDF password remover tool. The main advantage of this trick is that you require no extra software to remove PDF passwords. Furthermore, the time required is the least in this case. The trick for removing PDF file password using browser alone is to open the PDF file in the browser and then downloading it from the print option. Even though the process is same for every browser, the options may be spread around.

  1. Open the PDF file in the web browser by dragging and dropping the PDF file into a new tab. If that doesn’ t work, right click on the PDF file and click open with option. Then select your browser from the list.
  2. Right click on the file and hit print.
  3. Choose the printer as “Microsoft Print to PDF” and click on print.
  4. This should download the PDF file containing no passwords.

Use these web apps to remove PDF password

The main advantage of the trick is that it can be used to unlock PDF files right from your mobile device or tablet. However, decrypting PDF files of huge size is is not efficient with this method as the time taken for uploading, decrypting and downloading is high. There are several websites that offer free password removal from PDF files. We will take a look at some of the most popular PDF password remover websites. You can unlock PDF files using web applications no matter what platform you use i.e this method works for windows, mac, android, ios, etc.

Unlock PDF

Unlock Password allows you to remove PDF passwords instantly if you know the password. You can even remove passwords from files that you don’t own provided the PDF is weakly encrypted. Another cool feature of UnlockPDF is that you can add the password-protected PDF from your cloud storage such as Google drive and dropbox.

PDF Unlock

PDF Unlock is another popular site that allows you to remove password and restrictions from PDF file. You can add PDF files by dragging and dropping from your computer. Like UnlockPDF, this site also supports importing PDFs from cloud storage locations.

Recover lost PDF password and remove decryption using PDF Password Remover Software

Even though we have discussed two ways to remove PDF password, the fastest and the guaranteed decryption is achieved by using a PDF file password remover software. There are several such software but most of them are not free. One such software is Elcomsoft’s Advanced PDF Password Recovery software (APDFPR). The software is actually used to recover lost PDF password but it also packs a PDF decryption feature. To remove PDF encryption:

  1. Launch the APDFPR software and then click the open button located at the top left.
  2. Select the password protected PDF file from the dialog box and hit open.
  3. It will now ask you for the PDF file password. Enter the password and hit “Decrypt Now” to unlock the PDF instantly. If you don’t know the PDF password, choose the “Start Recovery ” option and wait for the recovery process to complete.

The steps to recover lost PDF password are similar to recovering lost zip file passwords.

Exit mobile version