PDF to TIFF Converter

This PDF to TIFF converter turns PDF pages into a single multi-page TIFF or one TIFF per page, at 100, 150, 200 or 300 DPI. Pick color, grayscale or 1-bit black and white, and Deflate, PackBits or no compression.

Every file carries its DPI in the resolution tags, so fax software, OCR programs and document systems read the right page size. The pages are drawn and encoded in your browser. The PDF is never uploaded, and there is no account, page limit or watermark.

TIFF is an older image format, but many systems still ask for it. Fax servers, document management and archive systems, older scanning workflows and OCR programs often take TIFF files and nothing else. A multi-page TIFF keeps all the pages together in one file, the way a PDF does.

Fax machines send black and white at about 200 DPI. Fine mode is 204 × 196 DPI and standard mode is 204 × 98 DPI. Set Color to Black and white and Resolution to 200 DPI, keep One multi-page TIFF, and choose PackBits or None if your fax service is strict about formats.

The threshold slider decides which pixels turn black. The default of 160 keeps thin and light text readable. Raise it if pale form lines or light text vanish. Lower it if a gray table shading or a colored header turns into a solid black block.

Many fax servers prefer CCITT Group 4 compression, the classic fax format. This tool does not write CCITT. Most online fax services and fax apps accept any TIFF and convert it themselves, but a fax server that only takes Group 4 files will reject these.

The color mode decides how much data each pixel takes. Uncompressed, an A4 page at 300 DPI is about 26 MB in color, 8.7 MB in grayscale and 1.1 MB in black and white. Deflate and PackBits shrink pages with plenty of white space a great deal, so text pages end up much smaller.

All three options are lossless, so the pixels you open are the pixels the tool drew. They differ in file size and in which programs can read them.

A TIFF holds pictures of the pages, so text can't be selected or searched afterwards. A system that needs searchable text has to run its own OCR on the TIFF, so keep the PDF if you need search.

The tool stops if the output passes 1 GB, which keeps the browser tab from running out of memory. A 100 page color PDF at 300 DPI with no compression would be about 2.6 GB. Switch to Deflate, grayscale or a lower DPI, or convert the pages in ranges.

Pages bigger than about 16.8 million pixels are drawn at a lower DPI so phones and tablets can handle them. A3 at 300 DPI comes out at about 295 DPI, and A1 or A0 drawings lower still. The real DPI is written into the file and the result screen tells you when it happened. If the PDF asks for a password to open, remove it with Unlock PDF first.