Make a PDF black and white before printing, without uploading it
Processed in your browser. Nothing is uploaded. Updated on 24 Oct 2026.Print shops and offices often ask for documents in black and white, and a colour PDF sent to a mono printer can come out with pale, unreadable text where a light colour was used. This page rewrites every colour in the file to the matching shade of grey, the way the PDF standard converts colour, so you see exactly what will print. Text stays text and can still be selected; nothing is uploaded.
Drop the PDF on the page, or press Select PDF files.
Press Convert to grayscale; colour text, logos, charts and photos all become shades of grey.
Press Download and print the new file on any printer without using colour ink.
Grayscale PDF turns a colour PDF into one that uses only shades of grey, ready for a black-and-white printer, a print shop that charges extra for colour, or an archive that asks for greyscale files.
Yes. Everything runs in your browser, in a background worker that keeps the page responsive, and the PDF is never uploaded. Password-protected files ask for their password first, and the converted copy is saved without one, so add it again with Protect PDF if you need it.
Need a smaller file afterwards? Use Compress PDF. To lock form answers before sending, use Flatten PDF.
The rest of the article, and all 6 questions about Grayscale PDF, are on the Grayscale PDF page.
Drop the PDF on this page or press Select PDF files, then press Convert to grayscale and download the result. Every colour in the text, drawings, gradients and pictures is rewritten to a shade of grey on your device. Several PDFs can be converted at once and come back as one zip file.
Yes. The tool changes only the colour commands inside each page, not the text itself, so words stay as real text that can be selected, searched and copied. Fonts, positions and links are left exactly as they were; only the colours become grey.
Usually a little. Colour photos are saved again with one grey channel instead of three, so pages with pictures often shrink by a third or more. A PDF of plain text barely changes in size. For a much smaller file, run the result through Compress PDF afterwards.
No. The conversion runs in your browser, in a background worker on your own device. The PDF is never sent anywhere, which is why private documents such as statements or contracts are safe to convert here, and it also works without a connection once the page has loaded.
Still stuck? Ask about Grayscale PDF and anybody who knows can answer. No account needed.
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