Redact a PDF or Image
Hide sensitive details before you share a document. Draw boxes over account numbers, addresses or signatures, or let the tool find Aadhaar numbers, then download a copy where those areas are gone.
- Runs on your device
- No sign-up
- Free, no watermark
How to use the Redact PDF
- 01Drop one PDF, or one or more JPG, PNG, WebP or iPhone HEIC images.
- 02Drag on the page to draw a black or white box over each thing to hide. Drag a box to move it and drag its corner to resize it.
- 03To hide Aadhaar numbers, press Find Aadhaar numbers, then look for any it missed.
- 04Go through every page, then press Redact PDF or Redact images.
- 05Download the redacted PDF, or the images one by one or together as a ZIP.
Good to know
Runs on your device
Your PDF or images are redacted by your browser. They are never uploaded.
Really removed
Pages with boxes are saved as images with the boxes painted in, so the text underneath can't be copied or recovered.
Other pages untouched
Pages without boxes are copied as they are, with selectable text. The title, author and other document details are removed.
Finds Aadhaar numbers
Covers the first 8 digits of each Aadhaar number it finds, like UIDAI's masked Aadhaar. Check every page yourself too.
Frequently asked questions
Is the text under a box really gone?
Yes. Each page with a box is rendered as an image at about 200 dpi, the box is painted onto that image, and the image replaces the page. The page's original text, fonts and pictures are not copied into the new file, so what was under the box can't be selected, searched or recovered. Pages without boxes are copied unchanged.
Why can't I select the text on some pages afterwards?
Those are the pages you redacted. Turning them into images is what makes sure the hidden text is removed: a black shape simply drawn on top of a PDF leaves the text underneath, where it can still be copied. Pages without boxes keep their selectable text.
How does Find Aadhaar numbers work?
It looks for 12-digit Aadhaar numbers printed as three groups of four, and 16-digit VIDs, and adds a box over the first 8 digits (12 for a VID), so the last 4 stay visible. Text in a PDF is searched directly. Scanned pages and photos are read with OCR (Tesseract, English), which your browser downloads from jsDelivr the first time. OCR can miss or misread a number, so always check every page.
Are my files uploaded?
No. Everything happens in your browser and your files never leave your device. The only download is the OCR engine and its English data, fetched from jsDelivr the first time you search a scan or photo; your file is not sent with it.
Can I redact a password-protected PDF?
Not if it needs a password to open. Remove the password first with the Unlock PDF tool. PDFs that open without a password but have copy or edit restrictions work; the redacted file won't keep those restrictions.
What happens to images?
The boxes are painted onto each image and it's saved again in the same format (JPG, PNG or WebP). Saving it again also removes photo details such as the location. iPhone HEIC photos are converted to JPG first.