How to redact a PDF

Drawing a black rectangle over a name, or highlighting it in black, only adds a layer on top. The original text is still in the file underneath. Anyone can select it and paste it into a text editor, find it with search, or move the box away in a PDF editor. Court filings and government reports have leaked exactly this way.

Real redaction deletes the content itself. In the Redact PDF tool, when you download, the text characters under each box are removed from the page and the covered pixels of any image are painted black. What remains is a black area with nothing behind it.

1. 1

   Open the PDF

   Go to Redact PDF and drop your file, or choose a file from your device. The editor opens with the Redact tool already selected.

2. 2

   Draw over sensitive content

   Drag a box over each name, number, signature or photo you want removed. The tool stays active, so you can draw box after box, on any page.

3. 3

   Cover every occurrence

   Use Find & replace (Ctrl+F) in the top bar to search for a name or number and jump to each match, then draw a box over it.

4. 4

   Adjust or remove boxes

   Click a box to select it, then drag its handles to resize it. Press Delete (Del) or use Undo (Ctrl+Z) to remove one you drew by mistake.

5. 5

   Download the redacted PDF

   Press Download PDF. This is the moment the content under the boxes is permanently removed. Then rename the file and press Download on the Your file is ready screen.

6. 6

   Check the result

   Open the new file, try to select or search for the redacted words, and confirm nothing comes up. The section below explains a quick way to check.

• Text under a box is deleted character by character. The surrounding text keeps its position, so the layout does not shift.
• Images, including scanned pages and photos, have the covered pixels painted black and are saved again. The original image data under the box is not kept.
• Lines and drawn shapes under a box are covered by the black area.

Some information lives outside the page content. Filled-in form fields and comments are separate layers that a redaction box does not touch. If a form field holds something private, clear it with the editor's Form tool first. If the PDF has sticky-note comments, check that none of them repeat what you are hiding.

Never send a redacted document without checking it. The quickest test is PDF to Text: open the redacted file there and search the extracted text for the name or number you removed. If it does not appear, the text is gone.

You can also open the file in any PDF reader, press Ctrl+F (Cmd+F on a Mac) and search for the redacted words, or try to select and copy the black area. Nothing should be selectable there.

A PDF also stores document properties: often the author's name, a company, the software used, creation dates and a title that may repeat the confidential subject. These are invisible on the page and redaction boxes do not reach them.

After redacting, open the file in Remove metadata. It shows what is stored, and Remove all metadata strips the title, author, subject, keywords, software and dates (including XMP data) without changing the pages.

Documents that need redaction are, by definition, the ones you should not upload to a stranger's server. PDFkind runs the whole process in your browser: the original, the boxes and the redacted copy stay on your device. It works on Windows, macOS, Linux, Android and iPhone, with no account. For other changes before you share, see how to edit a PDF.