How to Separate a Multi-Page PDF Without Adobe Acrobat

Splitting a PDF in Adobe's desktop app needs a paid Acrobat plan. The free Acrobat Reader opens and prints PDFs but cannot pull pages out into a new file. You do not need either of them. Here are four free methods, from the quickest to the most manual.

1. In your browser, on any device

The fastest way is to extract pages from the PDF in your browser. Choose the file, type the pages you want, such as 1-3,7, and press Run. To turn every page into its own file instead, split the PDF into single pages and download them as one ZIP.

Both tools run on your own device: the PDF is never uploaded, which matters for contracts, statements and anything else you would not email to a stranger. They also copy pages without re-printing them, so text, images and quality stay exactly as they were.

2. Preview on a Mac

1. Open the PDF in Preview and choose File, then Print.
2. Under Pages, enter the range you want, for example 4 to 9.
3. Open the PDF menu at the bottom of the dialog and choose Save as PDF.

You can also open the thumbnail sidebar (View, then Thumbnails), select pages with Command-click and drag them to the desktop to create a new PDF with just those pages.

3. Chrome or Edge print dialog

1. Open the PDF in Chrome or Edge.
2. Press Ctrl+P (Command+P on a Mac).
3. Set Destination to Save as PDF, set Pages to Custom and type the pages, for example 1-3,5.
4. Click Save.

4. Microsoft Print to PDF on Windows

From any PDF viewer, print the file, choose Microsoft Print to PDF as the printer, enter the page range and save. This works even in Acrobat Reader.

Which method should you use?

The print-based methods redraw each page as if printing it, so they can drop clickable links and fillable fields and sometimes enlarge the file. If you need the pages exactly as they were, extract them with a page range instead. To pick pages for particular documents, see the guides to extracting specific pages and splitting by page ranges.