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iana2776730
New Participant
February 10, 2016
Answered

How to change pdf page size using Acrobat DC

  • February 10, 2016
  • 20 replies
  • 613465 views

Easy way to change pdf document page size from US Letter to A4

    Correct answer denise_O_o

    I'm never sure why Adobe never tells you how to do this since it's right in the application. Use the Print Production tool. Click that, then click Preflight. Under the Profiles tab, be sure you're toggled to Pages. Now here's the trick - you'll see 3 little icons next to the Show All tab. Click the Wrench!! Scroll down and you'll see "Scale pages to specified size (Scales all pages of the PDF proportionally to entered value (fit from the inside and add white space)." 
    Click on the Edit flag. In the fixup category you should be on Pages, Type of Fixup is Scale pages.
    Choose the short edge and put in the new size you want. For example, if you're scaling from 34x22 down to 17x11, the short edge is 11, the long edge is 17. Apply to all pages. Or conversely, I was scaling UP 10x5.63 to 17x11. Short edge is 11, long edge is 17. For the adjustment I chose Fit from inside. It took my art and scaled it up from the center to fill the new 17" completely, on the short side it filled the top and bottom with white.

    If I were scaling from the 34x22 to 17x11, I would adjust it to "Fit from outside (scale page edges proportionally). It would essentially scale the file at 50%.
    Once you find this and work with it, you'll never have to rebuild a file again (as long as you're ok with some white space on a side that can't fill proportionally.

    20 replies

    S
    Simon28757540ofrs
    Participating Frequently
    January 3, 2025

    OK, here's how to do it. All Adobe instructions on this are completely and utterly useless, and you don't need to go into Preflight settings either.

     

    1. File > Print > Choose 'Adobe PDF' as the printer.

    2. Set the new page size. To do this, click Properties in the Print menu, go to the Adobe PDF Settings tab, and look for the Adobe PDF Page Size dropdown menu. Here you can select a preset page size (which you can do if all you need to do is switch from A4 to Letter etc.), or set up a custom size with the specifications you need. To set up a custom size, click Add (next to the Adobe PDF Page Size dropdown). Enter the page size you require, and give it a memorable name (under 'Paper Names'). Click Add/Modify. 

    3. Make sure your new page size is selected in the Adobe PDF Page Size dropdown, then click OK.

    4. Back on the Print menu, above the document preview box, you should see the original document size at the top of that box ('Document:'), and immediately under that you should see your new custom page size. Now just click Print, and the Save dialog box will come up. Choose where to save the new PDF. It will be at the new size.

    And that's it, you're done.

     

    I have no idea why they make this so hard to find, but once you know how to do it, it's straightforward.

    A
    Alejandro264154306q7b
    New Participant
    January 13, 2025

    This was the method that I recommended and seems to be the easiest. That being said, someone brought up one issue with it. I haven't confirmed, but someone mentioned that if you have links, when you go through the printing to PDF process, any links will be lost.

    Jnnnn
    Jnnnn
    Known Participant
    November 27, 2023

    Could somebody help me resize one pdf page in Acrobat Pro? I've read this forum but the advice either doesn't work or is written in a way that makes no sense. Which particular steps should I follow to make a page that is 10x larger than the others into the same size? The crop suggestion just . . . crops the page. I want to keep all the information just make it smaller. This seems incredibly simple and yet Adobe, as far as I can tell, has no easy way to do it. 

    albertyu647
    albertyu647
    New Participant
    July 20, 2023

    This worked for me.

     

    1. Click ‘Print’
    2. Set printer to ‘Adobe PDF’
    3. In ‘Page Sizing & Handling’ > Disable ‘Choose paper source from PDF page size’
    4. Click ‘Properties’ at the top next to ‘Printer’
    5. Go to ‘Layout’ tab > Click ‘advanced’
    6. In ‘Paper size’ choose ‘Postscript Custom Page Size’ and edit page size as needed.
    7. ‘OK’ everything and back in original ‘Print’ menu click ‘Fit’ under ‘Page sizing & handling’
    8. ‘Print’ to PDF
    Frogmum8
    Frogmum8
    New Participant
    February 7, 2023

    Super simple... Choose organize pages then in the menu bar click the 'more' drop down. Choose 'set page boxes'. Next screen at the bottom left choose 'fixed page sizes' & choose your page size. Click ok and your done. I just did this easily for a scanned document to make them all a uniform A4 size.  🙂

    M
    Mark28156179fuam
    New Participant
    January 29, 2023

    The easiest way I've found is to print it, select printer properties and choose A4 and it will automatically resize the page to the correct values.

     

    Y
    You_Xou3658
    New Participant
    December 12, 2024

    你好

    W
    Wade27462194y7ce
    New Participant
    December 6, 2022

    I would like to change a poster size from 52x36 to 24x36.  How do I do this?

     

    A
    Alejandro264154306q7b
    New Participant
    October 11, 2022

    Hello,

    This may be too little too late, but have you considered just using Acrobat's PDF printing feature? I literally just opened my PDF with pages that are off from the traditional letter size, and wanted to turn them into letter size. Switched my printer to "Adobe PDF," and set the page sizes and handling section to "fit." In page setup, I selected letter. Easy peasy, my PDF document pages are now all letter size. I suspect this would also work to go from letter to A4.

      S
      sarar78869016
      Known Participant
      June 14, 2023

      You probably won't see this, but for anyone else looking - this actually worked for me! I was able to resize A4 to US Letter perfectly, multiple pages at once! In case anyone else is as stoopid as me and is confused how to get it to actually save the PDF, follow all of Alejandro's steps, then at the end just press Print. It will ask you if you want to save the PDF and you can save it to your computer and it will be at the new size! I looked everywhere for how to do this, and this is the only way I found that worked. Lifesaver.

        W
        wasoxo259498294po7
        New Participant
        September 4, 2022

        How do I resize a PDF to A4 in Windows 11?
        I read on a site that this cannot be done in Windows 11 !

        source 1

        تور یونان

        T
        tixaj25949772hq3n
        New Participant
        September 4, 2022

        The Set page size will open up, enabling you to resize PDF to A4. Scroll to the "<>" icon on the bottom of the pop-up window, and then under the “Change Page Size” tab, select the “Page Sizes” box and choose “A4” page size.

          Z
          ZBalling
          Inspiring
          October 19, 2023

          That is impossible. You cannot decrease page size and so you cannot get smaller A4 (8.27' x 11.69') from default US Legal (as you can see in Word US Legal is 8.5' x 11.00'). So...

           

          Instead print pdf from Word to be A4. Simple and you get it.

          C
          Clear Concise
          New Participant
          August 24, 2022

          Why does you post this bad advice?


          Because that's easier than using Acrobat.

           

          Which tells us there is a problem with the program, because it should only need one screen and one drop-down box. From memory, it used to be like this in version 8 or 9.

          Bernd Alheit
          Bernd Alheit
          Community Expert
          August 23, 2022

          Why does you post this bad advice?

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