Want to send photos, scans or screenshots as a PDF, combine several JPGs into one file, or upload phone photos to a portal as A4 or Letter pages? PDF24 does this for free: online in the browser on any device, or offline with PDF24 Creator for Windows. This page explains the ways, every setting, and what to watch for with phone photos, quality and file size.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Contents<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The online tools work on Windows, Mac, Linux, iPhone and Android. Your files are deleted from the PDF24 server automatically after one hour. The free PDF24 Creator<\/a> with the Toolbox and the PDF printer is available for Windows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The gear icon (\"Additional options\") holds more settings:<\/p>\n\n\n\n PDF24 remembers your settings for your next visit, including an unticked \"Join\". If anything differs from the defaults, a round button with an arrow appears at the top right of the settings frame (\"Reset options to default values\"); it resets everything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JPG to PDF, PNG to PDF, WebP to PDF:<\/strong> these tools (JPG to PDF<\/a>, PNG to PDF<\/a>, WebP to PDF<\/a>) work exactly like \"Images to PDF\" and accept all common image formats too; their button is called \"Convert\". TIFF to PDF<\/a> turns each TIFF file into a PDF of its own, without settings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A multi-page TIFF file, such as a fax or a multi-page scan, becomes one PDF with all its pages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Is the PDF finished already? You can still reorder and rotate pages (sort and rotate pages<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n The three settings are the same online and in the Toolbox:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Important: with \"No margin\" the pages are at first not exactly A4 or Letter \u2013 this is the borderless mode.<\/strong> By default the checkbox \"Fit page height to image\"<\/strong> is ticked (online in the gear menu, in the Toolbox next to the margin; it appears only with \"No margin\"). Then the image is placed edge to edge across the full page width (A4 portrait 21 cm, landscape 29.7 cm; Letter 8.5 or 11 inches), and the page is as high as the image. A phone photo with a 3:4 aspect ratio becomes a page of 21 \u00d7 28 cm on A4; a wide photo becomes a short page. That is ideal on screen, because there are no white areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Exact A4 or Letter, e.g. for printing or an upload portal:<\/strong> there are two ways:<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the Toolbox the checkbox is available from PDF24 Creator 11.35.0.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tip:<\/strong> even for a binder, keep \"Automatic\" rather than \"Portrait\": landscape photos stay large, and the printer turns the page when printing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With the page size \"Use DPI\", each page gets exactly the size of its image at the resolution you enter: the width in pixels divided by the DPI value is the width in inches. The default is 150 DPI online and 144 DPI in the Toolbox.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The DPI value only changes the size of the page, not the image: all its pixels stay in the PDF. A higher value makes the page smaller, not the image sharper. PDF24 does not use the resolution stored in the image file here; enter the value yourself. A margin, if set, is added around the image.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Very long images, such as a screenshot of a whole web page, a till receipt or a webtoon, are spread by PDF24 over several pages of the chosen size, top to bottom. This happens when the image would be more than three pages high at the page width. That way the PDF can be printed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An image up to three times as high as the page is not split: without a margin its page gets correspondingly taller than A4 or Letter, with a margin it is shrunk onto one page. For long receipts that should print legibly on A4 or Letter, cut the image into parts in a picture program first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To keep the image as one long page, e.g. for reading on screen, untick \"Split long images over several pages\" (online in the gear menu, in the Toolbox as the last setting after the margin; if the checkbox is missing there, update PDF24 Creator to version 11.34.0 or later). With \"Use DPI\", each image is one page anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you have unticked \"Fit page height to image\" with \"No margin\", nothing is split and \"Split long images over several pages\" disappears: every image is shrunk onto exactly one page, so a long image becomes a narrow strip in the middle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Toolbox always makes one PDF from all images. The images never leave your PC. There is no fixed size limit; many large images just take time and memory. Below the result you can carry on right away, e.g. with \"Compress\" (file size<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Without opening the Toolbox: select one or more images in File Explorer, right-click them and choose \"PDF24\". In the window of the PDF24 File Tools, choose<\/p>\n\n\n\n This way each page has the shape of its image; page size and margin cannot be chosen here. For A4 or Letter pages with a margin, use \"Images to PDF\". On Windows 11, \"PDF24\" is in the new context menu, otherwise under \"Show more options\" (more about the context menu<\/a>). WebP images are best converted with \"Images to PDF\".<\/p>\n\n\n\n In scripts, the PDF24 DocTool does the same: If the image is open in a program right now, e.g. the Windows Photos app or an image editor, print it with Ctrl+P to the printer \"PDF24\". The PDF24 Assistant opens; there you save the PDF or send it. Several images printed one after another are combined into one PDF there with \"Join files\" (more about the PDF printer<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Good to know:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \"Images to PDF\" accepts, online and in the Toolbox:<\/p>\n\n\n\n HEIC (iPhone photos) is not supported.<\/strong> Save the photos as JPG first; how to do that is explained in the next section<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The file extension doesn't matter online: PDF24 recognises the format by the content. A photo saved as \".png\" that is really a JPG is converted correctly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Orientation:<\/strong> phones often store a photo taken upright in landscape and note in the file how it has to be turned (EXIF orientation). PDF24 follows this note for JPG photos: the photo stands in the PDF the way you see it on your phone. If an image still lies sideways or upside down, turn it before converting with the round arrows on its thumbnail (more<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Right on your phone:<\/strong> open Images to PDF<\/a> in the browser, tap \"Choose files\" and pick the photos from your gallery. If you use PDF24 on your phone often, you can put the online tools on your home screen like an app (how<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n iPhone photos in HEIC format:<\/strong> save them as JPG before converting them:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sometimes a HEIC file is named \".jpg\" but is still HEIC. Online, PDF24 tells you so with the file name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Quality:<\/strong> \"Images to PDF\" takes JPG photos over unchanged and all other formats losslessly. The images in the PDF are as sharp as the originals; a blurry or small image does not get better in a PDF.<\/p>\n\n\n\n File size:<\/strong> JPG photos go into the PDF unchanged, so the PDF is about as large as the photos together: ten phone photos of 4 MB each make around 40 MB. WebP images, on the other hand, are stored losslessly and make the PDF much larger than the images themselves. Too large for email or a portal?<\/p>\n\n\n\n With \"No margin\" and the checkbox \"Fit page height to image\" (default), each page is as high as its image. Untick it or choose a margin, e.g. \"5 mm\", and all pages have exactly the chosen size (more<\/a>). With the right-click \"Convert to PDF\" and when printing, the page follows the image or the program; for uniform pages use \"Images to PDF\".<\/p>\n\n\n\n Turn it before converting with the round arrows on its thumbnail. In a finished PDF, rotate single pages with Rotate PDF<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If only some images are missing online, the result tells you which file was not taken over. In the Toolbox, check the page count of the PDF.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \"Join\" in the gear menu is unticked, often still from an earlier visit. Tick it again (more<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n \"Images to PDF\" does not change the images. If an image looks blurry, the original already has few pixels, or the PDF was compressed afterwards. If you printed the image to the PDF printer, choose the profile \"High quality\" or \"Best quality\" in the Assistant, or use \"Images to PDF\".<\/p>\n\n\n\n Shrink it with Compress PDF<\/a> (more<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n The transparency is kept; PDF viewers just show the page on white paper (more<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Untick \"Split long images over several pages\" (more<\/a>). If this checkbox is missing, \"Fit page height to image\" is unticked with \"No margin\"; tick it again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
Which way suits you?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Convert images to PDF online: step by step<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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One PDF for all images or one PDF per image<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Change the order and rotate images<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Page size, orientation and margin: how to get exact A4 or Letter pages<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Page as large as the image: \"Use DPI\"<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Long images and screenshots<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Offline in the PDF24 Toolbox<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Right-click in File Explorer<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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-convertToPDF<\/code> makes a PDF of each image, -join<\/code> combines them into one PDF (manual<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\nPrint an image to the PDF printer<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Which image formats work? JPG, PNG, TIFF, WebP, HEIC<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Phone photos: orientation and the iPhone format HEIC<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Image quality and file size<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Scanned pages and photos of documents<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Several images on one page, an image into an existing PDF<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Problems and solutions<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
The pages are not A4 or have different sizes<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
A photo lies sideways or upside down<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
An image is missing from the PDF or is not accepted<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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You get a ZIP file instead of a PDF<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The images look worse in the PDF<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The PDF is too large<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The transparent background of a PNG is white<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
A long image was spread over many pages<\/h3>\n\n\n\n