PDFs - How to Reduce the File Size (to Allow Sending via Email)

Notes

It is best practice to share PDF files via SharePoint or OneDrive (Helpful Article shows how to do this). Some clients don't allow their employees to access these sites, so it becomes necessary to be able to email the PDFs. This procedure shows two ways to reduce the file size of a PDF without altering the content. This article uses PDF-Xchange for examples as that is the PDF app predominantly used at MJ, but Adobe Acrobat offers the same functionality.

GMail, Yahoo!, and Outlook (personal account) have receiving size limits of 25 MB for an email, including all attachments and the email body (and other overhead). In order to send a PDF via email, the entire email (including the PDF) must be under this 25 MB limit.

Procedure

Method One - Print to PDF

We start with a PDF file that is 5,075 KB to use as a baseline (this could be emailed easily, but is used as an example to show the size reduction).
The PDF file size can sometimes be reduced simply by "printing" the file to PDF. In PDF-Xchange, do the following:
1. Click File > Print
2. Select the printer dropdown and choose "PDF-XChange Standard" (Microsoft Print to PDF will also work)
3. In the example below, PDF-XChange Standard reduced the file size more than Microsoft Print to PDF (but both reduced the size significantly)
4. If this is enough to fit the email under 25 MB, attach the PDF and send it!

Method Two - Optical Character Recognition (OCR)

This method is very effective for scanned documents, as the PDF is essentially a "picture" of the text and images that were scanned. OCR converts the "picture" of text into actual text that can be edited.

We start using the same base PDF (5,075 KB)
In PDF-XChange, click "Convert" from the top menu
Next, click "OCR Page(s)" from the ribbon
This will open a menu of options:
1. It is recommended to choose All pages (located at the top), and "Detect skew of page content" to align the text on the page.
2. The options below should be selected by default:
Click "OK" and the OCR process will begin.
Once completed, save the document (or Save As to retain the original)
1. The file size of OCR in this example was reduced by 40% from the original
Note: To use OCR in Adobe Acrobat, choose the "Scan and OCR" tool and select "Recognize Text".

If the PDF is still too large to send via email, it will need to be split into multiple parts or another way will need to be used to transfer it to the client.

If you have any issues, please submit a helpdesk ticket and we'll be happy to assist!