How to Convert PDF to JPG (Free, Any Device)

To convert a PDF to JPG for free, use File > Export in Preview on a Mac, the Export command in the Preview app on an iPhone, PDF24 Creator on Windows, or a browser converter from Adobe, PDF24, or iLovePDF on any device, including Android. Each PDF page becomes its own JPG. Set the resolution to 150 DPI for screens or 300 DPI for print, and use an offline method for private documents.

Checked on October 30, 2026 against the pages Apple, Adobe, PDF24, iLovePDF, and CloudConvert publish. We also ran the pdftoppm and sips commands on a Mac that day. Scholarly does not convert file formats, so none of these tools is ours.

Mac (built in):

1. Open the PDF in Preview.
2. For a multi-page PDF, open View > Thumbnails and click the page you want. Preview handles this job one page at a time, so check that you got the right page.
3. Choose File > Export.
4. Set Format to JPEG and adjust Quality. If a Resolution field appears, set it to 150 or 300.
5. Click Save.

Windows (free, offline):

1. Install the free PDF24 Creator. It is Windows-only and files stay on your PC.
2. Open its PDF to Images tool.
3. Add your PDF and choose JPG.
4. Set the DPI to 150 for screen or 300 for printing.
5. Convert and save.

iPhone (built in):

1. Open the PDF in the Preview app.
2. Tap the menu next to the filename, then tap Export.
3. Choose JPEG, then set Size and Resolution. Apple says higher values give larger, more detailed images.
4. Save the file.

If your iPhone does not have the Preview app, or you need every page of a long PDF at once, use a browser converter.

Android (browser, nothing to install):

1. Open Chrome and go to iLovePDF's PDF to JPG page or Adobe's PDF to JPG page.
2. Upload the PDF. On iLovePDF, pick Page to JPG, not Extract images.
3. Convert and download.

Terminal (fastest for long documents):

pdftoppm -jpeg -r 300 input.pdf page

That writes page-1.jpg, page-2.jpg, and so on. Install Poppler first with brew install poppler on Mac or sudo apt install poppler-utils on Debian or Ubuntu.

Which method should you use?

Your situation	Best method	Cost
One page, on a Mac	Preview, then File > Export > JPEG	Free, built in
One diagram or region of a page (Mac)	Preview, select the area, New from Clipboard, Export	Free, built in
Any PDF, on Windows	PDF24 Creator (offline) or a browser converter	Free
On iPhone	Preview app, then Export > JPEG	Free, built in
On Android	Adobe, iLovePDF, or PDF24 in the browser	Free, with limits on some
Many pages or many PDFs at once	pdftoppm in a terminal, or PDF24	Free
Sensitive document (transcript, ID, contract)	An offline method: Preview, PDF24 Creator, or pdftoppm	Free
Exact DPI control	pdftoppm, PDF24, or the Resolution field in Preview	Free

How to convert PDF to JPG on a Mac (Preview, two methods)

macOS handles this natively, with no downloads and no uploads.

Method 1: Export a page with Preview

Apple's Preview guide gives the short version: open the file, choose File > Export, and pick a file type from the Format menu.

1. Open the PDF in Preview.
2. In a multi-page PDF, open the sidebar (View > Thumbnails) and click the page you want.
3. Choose File > Export.
4. In the Format menu, choose JPEG.
5. Set the Quality slider. About 80 to 90% is a good balance for sharp text without a huge file.
6. If you see a Resolution field, raise it to 300 when you plan to zoom in or print.
7. Click Save.

For a 40-page PDF, use pdftoppm or a converter instead of exporting pages one by one.

Method 2: Export just a region (one diagram, one table)

If you only need a figure from a page, such as a diagram from lecture slides, skip the crop step:

1. Open the PDF in Preview and go to the page.
2. Choose Tools > Rectangular Selection.
3. Drag a box around the diagram.
4. Press Command-C, then choose File > New from Clipboard. The selection opens as a new image.
5. Choose File > Export, then pick JPEG, or PNG for sharp lines and text.

Zoom in before selecting if you need a higher-resolution crop.

How to convert PDF to JPG on Windows

We found no Microsoft documentation for a built-in PDF to JPG export in Windows, so use a free tool. The Photos app's print-to-PDF route only goes the other way, from image to PDF.

Quick workaround: Snipping Tool

1. Open the PDF in Edge or any viewer and zoom so the page fills the screen.
2. Press Win + Shift + S and drag across the page.
3. Click the notification, then save the capture.

This is fine for pasting a page into a chat or a slide, but the detail is limited to what your screen shows. For anything that needs to stay sharp, use a real converter.

Free Windows tools that convert properly

• PDF24 Creator: free for private and business use, and PDF24 says it works offline, so files stay on your PC. It runs on Windows only.
• IrfanView: freeware for non-commercial use. To open PDFs, its FAQ says you need the IrfanView plugins plus Ghostscript. After that you can use File > Save As and pick JPG.

If you don't want to install anything, use a browser tool from the next section.

How to convert PDF to JPG on iPhone

The Preview app on iPhone does this directly. Apple's guide lists HEIC, JPEG, PDF, PNG, and TIFF as export formats, with a Resolution setting when you export a PDF to an image format. Apple does not spell out how a long PDF is split across images, so check the output on your first try. If it does not give you every page, use a browser converter.

For a quick one-off where quality does not matter, take a screenshot of the page and crop it.

How to convert PDF to JPG on Android

Use a browser tool. It works on any Android phone with nothing to install, and you avoid ad-heavy converter apps.

1. Open Chrome and go to iLovePDF, Adobe, or PDF24 (links below).
2. Upload, convert, and download.
3. If the document is private, use a computer and an offline method instead.

For a quick one-off, open the PDF in your viewer, take a screenshot, and crop it. That gives you screen resolution only.

Converting PDF to JPG in the browser (no install)

Tool	What the free version gives you	Good to know
Adobe Acrobat online	JPG, PNG, or TIFF output in any browser, no watermark	Adobe's FAQ says you get one free transaction without signing in. A free account opens more tools. Files are deleted unless you sign in to save them.
PDF24 online	No registration and no stated limits, with DPI and image quality settings	Funded by ads. Files are deleted from its German servers after one hour.
iLovePDF	Page to JPG for whole pages, Extract images for the photos inside the PDF	The free plan has limited document processing.
CloudConvert	Conversion credits that reset daily on the free plan	Its pricing page lists the current allowance.

Privacy rule of thumb: a browser converter uploads your file to someone else's server, at least briefly. For transcripts, IDs, contracts, or anything with personal data, use Preview, PDF24 Creator, or pdftoppm, where the file stays on your device.

Converting with Adobe Acrobat (paid desktop)

If you already pay for Acrobat, Adobe's export guide starts from the Convert button in the top toolbar, or Export a PDF in the All tools menu. Choose an image format from there. Nobody needs to buy Acrobat just for this job.

Command line one-liners (pdftoppm, ImageMagick, sips)

For repeatable conversion, or when you have 200 pages, the terminal beats every menu.

pdftoppm (the best tool for this job)

pdftoppm ships with Poppler. It converts every page with exact control, and we ran these commands on a Mac on October 30, 2026:

# Every page: page-1.jpg, page-2.jpg, and so on, at 300 DPI
pdftoppm -jpeg -r 300 input.pdf page

# Set the JPEG quality yourself
pdftoppm -jpeg -r 300 -jpegopt quality=90 input.pdf page

# Only pages 3 through 5
pdftoppm -jpeg -r 300 -f 3 -l 5 input.pdf page

If you leave out -r, the manual says it uses 150 DPI.

ImageMagick

# All pages: output-0.jpg, output-1.jpg, and so on
magick -density 300 input.pdf -quality 90 output.jpg

# All pages stacked into one tall JPG
magick -density 150 input.pdf -append combined.jpg

-density sets the resolution PDFs are read at and belongs before the input file. ImageMagick needs Ghostscript to read PDFs, and some Linux setups block PDF reading in a security policy. If you hit that, use pdftoppm instead. We did not run these two commands in our October check.

sips (preinstalled on every Mac)

sips -s format jpeg input.pdf --out output.jpg

No install, with one big limit. In our test on a two-page PDF, sips wrote a single file for the first page at 612 x 792 pixels, which is 72 DPI for a US Letter page. Use it for one-page receipts or certificates, not documents.

Batch converting many pages or many PDFs

• Many pages, one PDF: pdftoppm and PDF24 handle every page. Preview and sips do not.
• Many PDFs at once, in a shell:

for f in *.pdf; do pdftoppm -jpeg -r 200 "$f" "${f%.pdf}"; done

This converts every PDF in the folder and names the images after each source file.

• Windows, no terminal: PDF24 Creator is the place to start.

What DPI should you use? 72 vs 150 vs 300

DPI (dots per inch) decides how many pixels each page becomes, and it is the setting behind most blurry conversions. A US Letter page (8.5 x 11 inches) renders to:

DPI	Pixel dimensions	Good for
72	612 x 792	Thumbnails only. Text looks fuzzy on a modern screen.
150	1275 x 1650	Sharing, slides, and viewing on screen
300	2550 x 3300	Printing, zooming in, OCR, archiving
600	5100 x 6600	Rarely worth it: four times the pixels of 300

Defaults vary by tool. pdftoppm uses 150, and sips gave us 72 in our test. If output looks blurry, re-convert at 150 to 300 DPI before you touch JPG quality.

JPG quality is the second dial. It controls compression, not pixel count. Quality 80 to 90 is a reasonable range for documents. Lower settings can leave smudgy halos around text, and very high settings add file size you will not see.

JPG vs PNG vs WebP: which format should you pick?

Format	Compression	Best for	Watch out for
JPG	Lossy	Scanned pages, photos, mixed content; accepted almost everywhere	Artifacts around sharp text at lower quality
PNG	Lossless	Text-heavy pages, diagrams, line art; supports transparency	Larger files for photo-like pages
WebP	Lossy or lossless	Web use	Some older apps and upload forms reject it

Practical rule: JPG for scans and photos, PNG for crisp text and diagrams, WebP for a website you control. JPG and JPEG are the same format, so a form that demands one accepts the other.

Multi-page PDFs: one JPG per page, or one big image?

A JPG holds one image, so a 10-page PDF becomes 10 separate JPGs.

If a form accepts only one image file, stack the pages vertically with ImageMagick, as shown above. Keep it to a few pages, because a long strip becomes unwieldy and some apps refuse very large images.

Common problems and fixes

Blurry or fuzzy output. The tool rendered at too low a DPI. Re-convert at 150 to 300 using the DPI option in PDF24, -r 300 for pdftoppm, or -density 300 for ImageMagick. Raising JPG quality will not fix this.

Text has smudgy halos. These are JPG compression artifacts, and hard black-on-white edges show them most. Raise quality to 90 or switch to PNG.

Files are huge. Drop from 300 to 150 DPI, which cuts the pixel count by four. Lower quality to around 80 to 85.

ImageMagick says "operation not allowed by the security policy 'PDF'". Your system's ImageMagick policy blocks PDFs. Use pdftoppm instead.

Password-protected PDF won't convert. Open it with the password first and export from there. Only do this for documents you are allowed to open.

Colors look washed out. The PDF may use print colors (CMYK). Add -colorspace sRGB to an ImageMagick command or try another converter.

Characters are missing or fonts look wrong. The converter could not handle an embedded font. Try a different one, such as pdftoppm or Adobe. Once a page is a JPG, the text is pixels, so it looks the same everywhere.

FAQ: saving PDFs as JPGs

What's the fastest free way to save a PDF as a JPG?

On a Mac, open it in Preview and choose File > Export > JPEG. On Windows, use PDF24 Creator offline, or a browser converter. On iPhone, use Export in the Preview app. On Android, use iLovePDF, Adobe, or PDF24 in the browser.

Can I convert a PDF to JPG without uploading it anywhere?

Yes. Preview on Mac and iPhone, PDF24 Creator on Windows, and command-line tools like pdftoppm all work on your device. Use one of these for transcripts, IDs, contracts, or anything you wouldn't email to a stranger.

Why is my converted JPG blurry?

The page was rendered at too few pixels, often 72 to 96 DPI or a screenshot. Re-convert at 150 DPI for screen use or 300 DPI for printing and zooming.

What DPI should I use for PDF to JPG?

Use 150 DPI for sharing and on-screen viewing, and 300 DPI for printing, zooming, or OCR. 72 DPI suits thumbnails, and 600 DPI is rarely worth the larger file.

Does converting PDF to JPG reduce quality?

Yes, in two ways. Rasterizing turns scalable text into fixed pixels, and JPG compression is lossy. The text also stops being selectable and searchable unless you run OCR, so convert a copy and keep the original PDF.

How do I convert every page of a PDF to JPGs at once?

Use PDF24, iLovePDF's Page to JPG option, or pdftoppm -jpeg -r 300 input.pdf page in a terminal. Mac Preview and sips are not built for this.

Can I turn a multi-page PDF into a single JPG?

Not directly, because a JPG holds one image. Stack the pages with ImageMagick: magick -density 150 input.pdf -append combined.jpg. It is practical for a few pages and unwieldy beyond that.

Is JPG different from JPEG?

No. They are the same format with two spellings of the file extension.

If you are converting to study, you may not need the JPG

Scholarly does not convert PDFs to JPGs, so use one of the tools above for that. But some conversions are a study workaround, such as screenshotting slides into a notes app or turning textbook pages into images for flashcards. A JPG loses what makes a PDF useful for studying, because the text stops being searchable and quotable.

If studying is the goal, upload the PDF itself to Scholarly. The PDF to flashcards generator builds spaced-repetition cards from the text, the PDF summarizer condenses a long chapter, and PDF to video turns the document into a narrated video lecture. If you already have photos of handwritten notes or scans, image to flashcards reads those directly.

The free plan is a one-time allowance: one upload (8 MB, first 32 PDF pages) and one AI creation for the life of the account, with no credit card. Downloads need a paid plan.

Related PDF guide: How to Add a Signature to a PDF (Free - Mac, Windows, iPhone & Android). Going the other way? See how to convert JPG to PDF.