PDF is a widely used and very practical format, but not very flexible. If it does not allow you to take images of a file, there are, however, very simple solutions to achieve this. In this quick tutorial, we’ll give you some of them. Three to be precise.
A PDF file is not interactive, so it is not possible to extract an image or a part as one might do with a Word document or a PowerPoint. Still, there are easy solutions to make it happen. In this tutorial we will give you three simple manipulations to extract an image from a PDF. If you are not comfortable with computers, rest assured, these methods can be done by anyone.
Before you start, know that these manipulations are all performed on Windows 10 (and also work on Windows 11). But some of them can also be used on Mac.
Use the Windows screenshot tool:
Windows 10 offers several ways to take screenshots easily. You can take a look at the different manipulations in this dedicated tutorial, but for this one, we will be content with the simplest:
- Open your PDF and go to where there is the image that interests you.
- Open screenshot tool (via the Windows search bar at the bottom left of your taskbar).
- On this tool, click New
- Select the part of the PDF you want to save
- Save your image
Note that this method works for a PDF, but not only, the screenshot tool works on everything that is displayed in front of your eyes. You can therefore use it on Internet pages, on various documents or even on applications.
Use LibreOffice:
LibreOffice is a free software suite that could roughly be compared to Microsoft’s Office suite. It allows you to easily retrieve an image from a PDF:
- Open your PDF with LibreOffice Base (using the context menu, right click on the icon, and click on Open with)
- If you can’t find it in the list, click Choose another application and select LibreOffice
- The document opens
- You will be able to save all the images present in the document independently by right clicking on them.
A very simple method, but one that has the disadvantage of making you download something, which you don’t necessarily want.
Use a third-party site:
It is also possible to go through specialized sites to extract images from a PDF. An extremely basic method, undoubtedly the simplest of this tutorial. It has the advantage of being entirely online, and therefore of not forcing you to download a dedicated tool on your computer.
- Go to the site ILovePDF
- Then click on PDF to JPG
- Click on Select the PDF file.
- Once done, select one of the two options on the right. It is possible to extract all the pages as they are which will be transformed into independent JPGs, or to take only the images of the original file.
- Wait a few seconds for the conversion to take place.
- Download your file to your computer and unzip it.
This method has the advantage of being fast and of having all the images at once. Handy if you want to recover everything in a PDF.
There are of course other methods to take images from a PDF, such as with Adobe Acrobat Reader, Photoshop (paid) or PDF Converter. In fact, all of them have the same result: you have the image you want outside of the original file. With these three techniques, you should be able to get by easily., even if you are not good with a computer. Do not hesitate to give your methods in the comments!
