Most email providers cap attachments at 25 MB, but many corporate mail servers and government systems reject anything over 10 MB. Even stricter limits - 5 MB on some platforms, 2 MB on others - catch people off guard when a bounce message arrives instead of a delivery confirmation.
The good news: many PDFs can be reduced enough for strict upload forms or email systems without buying software or making the text hard to read. Here is the practical workflow.
Why PDFs get large in the first place
PDF size is driven by what is inside the file:
- Embedded images from scans or photos are the biggest culprit. A single uncompressed scan page can be 2–8 MB on its own.
- Embedded fonts add 50–200 KB each, more for complex typefaces.
- Metadata and revision history left by word processors can quietly add hundreds of KB.
- Transparency and vector layers from design tools bloat complex graphics.
Step 1: Use a PDF compressor
The fastest path is online compression. Pagivo's Compress PDF tool re-encodes images at a lower resolution and strips metadata without touching the text or page layout.
- Go to Compress PDF on Pagivo.
- Upload your file - drag and drop or click to browse.
- Choose a compression level:
- Optimize - keeps text sharp, slightly reduces image quality. Best for contracts, reports, and anything with fine print.
- Balanced - a middle ground. Good default for mixed documents.
- Compact - maximum reduction. Use this if size is the only concern and the document has no fine print.
- Click Process and download. The compressed file downloads automatically.
For many office documents and scanned forms, "Balanced" can make a noticeable difference. A 10 MB scan may still need Compact mode if the upload form has a strict 2 MB or 5 MB cap.
Step 2: If one pass is not enough, remove unnecessary pages
If the compressed file is still over 2 MB, identify which pages are driving the size. Scans of photographs, full-colour cover pages, or full-page graphics are almost always the culprit. Use Split PDF to extract the heavy pages, then send the rest first and the large pages separately.
Step 3: For scanned documents, lower the scan resolution at the source
If you control the scanner, set it to 150 DPI for documents that will only be read on screen, or 200 DPI for anything that needs to be printed. Scanning at 300 DPI - the default on most scanners - produces files roughly four times larger than 150 DPI with no visible difference on a monitor.
What the compressor does not change
Pagivo's compressor does not alter text or page order. The recipient gets the same pages - just in a smaller file. If the PDF is password-protected, unlock it first and then compress the unlocked copy.