30 PDF tools that run entirely on your own computer. No internet, no uploads to someone else's server, no subscription, no limits.
Merge, split, compress, OCR scanned documents, convert to and from Word, Excel, PowerPoint, JPG and Markdown, add watermarks and signatures, encrypt with a password, permanently redact sensitive data — all free and fully local.
Interface languages: English and Russian, switchable in Settings.
Online services like iLovePDF, Smallpdf and PDF24 are convenient, but they come with three problems:
- Your documents go to someone else's server. Contracts, passports, medical records, financial reports — all uploaded to a cloud you don't control.
- Subscriptions. You pay every month to lift limits on tools that are otherwise identical.
- Restrictions. File size caps, a few tasks per day, watermarks stamped on your output.
PDF Master solves all three. It is an ordinary desktop application: your files never leave the machine, there is nothing to pay for, and there are no limits. It doesn't need an internet connection at all — you can work on a plane.
Every tool shows a live preview of the result before you commit to anything: settings on the left, the actual output on the right. Change the watermark angle and the preview updates immediately. A Before / After toggle compares against the original, and the thumbnail strip at the bottom shows every page of the document you are about to get.
Watermark tool: change a setting and the result on the right refreshes on its own
30 tools grouped by category
More screenshots: page organiser and compression
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
| Merge PDF | Combines several files into one; reorder them by dragging |
| Split PDF | By page ranges, every N pages, or extract only the pages you need |
| Remove pages | Deletes pages by number |
| Organise PDF | Visual editor: drag, rotate and delete pages with the mouse |
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
| Compress PDF | Three levels; shows how much smaller the file becomes before you save it |
| Repair PDF | Fixes damaged files that refuse to open |
| OCR | Makes scans searchable and selectable. Russian, English and 100+ other languages |
| Flatten PDF | Bakes form fields and annotations into the page content |
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
| Images to PDF | JPG, PNG, HEIC (from iPhone), TIFF, WebP. Page size and margins are configurable |
| Office to PDF | Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OpenDocument |
| HTML to PDF | A local HTML file or an entire website by URL |
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
| PDF to JPG/PNG | Pages as images, up to 300 DPI |
| PDF to Word | Editable DOCX with the layout preserved |
| PDF to Excel | Extracts tables into XLSX |
| PDF to PowerPoint | One slide per page |
| PDF to PDF/A | ISO archival format (1b, 2b, 3b) |
| PDF to text | All text as TXT |
| PDF to Markdown | Structured text — handy for notes and for feeding documents to an LLM |
| Extract images | Pulls out every image embedded in the document |
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
| Rotate PDF | 90/180/270°, applied to all, odd, even or selected pages |
| Page numbers | 9 positions, 5 fonts, custom format, skip the cover, mirrored for facing pages |
| Watermark | Text or image, any angle from 0 to 360°, opacity, mosaic tiling, above or below the content |
| Crop PDF | Draw a frame with the mouse and preview the crop |
| Edit PDF | Add text, images, rectangles, ellipses, highlights and white-out boxes |
| Metadata | Title, author, subject, keywords |
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
| Protect PDF | Password and AES-256 encryption, with printing and copying permissions |
| Unlock PDF | Removes a password you already know |
| Sign PDF | Draw a signature, type it, or upload an image; place it anywhere |
| Redact | Permanently removes text from the file instead of painting a black box over it |
| Compare PDFs | Produces a report highlighting the differences between two versions |
One command in Terminal:
git clone https://github.com/theamir29/pdf-master.git && cd pdf-master && bash scripts/install_macos.shThe script installs everything that is needed (Homebrew must already be present) and creates a PDF Master application in your Applications folder — from then on you launch it from Launchpad like any other app.
Manual installation
brew install ghostscript tesseract tesseract-lang qpdf
brew install --cask libreoffice
python3 -m venv venv
./venv/bin/pip install -r requirements.txt
./venv/bin/python desktop.pyIn PowerShell:
git clone https://github.com/theamir29/pdf-master.git
cd pdf-master
powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File scripts\install_windows.ps1The script installs Python and the required engines through winget, then creates a PDF Master shortcut on your Desktop and in the Start menu.
Manual installation
winget install ArtifexSoftware.GhostScript
winget install UB-Mannheim.TesseractOCR
winget install TheDocumentFoundation.LibreOffice
python -m venv venv
.\venv\Scripts\pip install -r requirements.txt
.\venv\Scripts\python desktop.pysudo apt install ghostscript tesseract-ocr tesseract-ocr-rus libreoffice qpdf
python3 -m venv venv && ./venv/bin/pip install -r requirements.txt
./venv/bin/python desktop.pyThe app doesn't bundle a gigabyte and a half of binaries — it uses well-established open-source programs instead. The Settings → Components tab shows what was found, what wasn't, and gives you a ready-to-paste install command.
| Component | Used for | Without it |
|---|---|---|
| Ghostscript | PDF compression, PDF/A | The other 28 tools still work |
| Tesseract OCR | Text recognition in scans | Only OCR is unavailable |
| LibreOffice | Office → PDF | Only Word/Excel/PowerPoint conversion is unavailable |
| Chrome or Edge | HTML → PDF | Only that one tool is unavailable |
None of them is mandatory: a tool whose engine is missing politely tells you what to install, and everything else keeps working.
- The server binds to
127.0.0.1— it is reachable only from your own machine, never from the network. - No file is ever transmitted anywhere. There is not a single outbound network request in the codebase.
- Easy to verify: turn off Wi-Fi and everything keeps working.
- Uploaded files live in a temporary folder and are deleted after 24 hours.
- Finished files go to the folder you choose (
Downloads/PDF Masterby default).
| Layer | Technology |
|---|---|
| Interface | Plain HTML, CSS and JavaScript — no framework, loads instantly |
| App window | pywebview (WebKit on macOS, WebView2 on Windows) |
| Server | FastAPI + Uvicorn, localhost only |
| PDF core | PyMuPDF, pikepdf, Ghostscript |
| Conversion | pdf2docx, pdfplumber, python-pptx, img2pdf, LibreOffice |
| OCR | OCRmyPDF + Tesseract |
app/env.py — locates engines and fonts, performs OS actions (macOS / Windows / Linux)
app/ops.py — all 30 PDF operations
app/main.py — HTTP API, including the result preview
app/i18n.py — server-side translations: messages and output file names
app/config.py — settings, task history, folders
static/i18n.js — interface dictionary (English and Russian)
static/ — the interface
desktop.py — launches the window
Adding your own tool is straightforward: write a function in app/ops.py, register it in the TOOLS dictionary, add its icon and settings to static/app.js, and its name to both dictionaries. The preview will start working on its own.
Is it really free? Yes, MIT licensed. Use it, modify it and redistribute it, including inside a company.
Are my files really never uploaded? Yes. The source is open, so you can check — there are no outbound requests in it.
How is this different from iLovePDF Desktop? Same set of tools, without the subscription and without sending files to a cloud. On top of that: a live result preview in every tool, arbitrary watermark angles, and PDF-to-Markdown conversion, none of which the original has.
Is installation complicated? One command. After that it's a normal icon in Launchpad or on your Desktop.
Does it run on Apple Silicon (M1–M4)? Yes, and on Intel Macs too.
Can I use it in another language? English and Russian ship with the app — switch in Settings → General → Interface language. Adding a third language means copying one block in static/i18n.js and one column in app/i18n.py; pull requests are welcome.
Found a bug, or want a tool that isn't there yet? Open an issue or send a pull request. Details in CONTRIBUTING.md.
Especially useful right now:
- More interface languages (see
static/i18n.js) - Batch processing of an entire folder
- Compressing to a target size ("fit into 5 MB")
- PDF form filling
- Prebuilt installers (
.dmgand.exe)
MIT — do what you like, just keep the attribution notice.
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