Merging two PDFs is one of the most common office tasks: the contract and its appendices, the quarter's invoices, the résumé and the cover letter. The usual routine is to search "merge PDF", open the first result and upload the files. Few people stop to think where those documents go.
What happens when you upload a PDF to a website
Most online PDF services work like this: your files travel to their servers, get processed there and the result is sent back. Reputable services encrypt the connection and delete files after a few hours, and say so in their privacy policy. Even so:
- You lose control over where the document is stored and for how long.
- Your company may not allow it. Many internal policies, and data protection laws such as the GDPR, require not sending customers' or employees' personal data to third parties without a data processing agreement.
- Office documents contain sensitive data: ID numbers, bank accounts, salaries, signatures, addresses.
For a public brochure it doesn't matter. For a payslip, a contract or a medical file, it does.
The alternative: process the PDF in your browser
Today's browsers can read and write PDFs with JavaScript without sending anything anywhere. That's what Toolbrik's PDF tools do: the page downloads once and, from then on, all the work happens on your computer.
You can check it yourself: open the tool, turn off your Wi-Fi and use it. If it works offline, your files aren't going anywhere.
How to merge PDFs
- Open the merge PDF tool.
- Drop the files or choose them. You'll see how many pages each one has.
- Reorder them with the arrows: the first one in the list goes at the start.
- Click "Merge PDFs" and a single document downloads.
Full pages are copied with their text, images and fonts, without recompressing anything. Text stays selectable and searchable.
How to split a PDF or extract pages
The split PDF tool has two modes:
- Extract pages: type the pages you want using the same syntax as the print dialog:
1-3, 5, 8-. Hyphens mean ranges and an open range like8-runs to the end. Pages come out in the order you type them, so5, 1-4also moves page 5 to the front. - Split all pages: creates one file per page. Handy when your bank or accountant sends all the year's payslips or invoices in a single PDF.
Typical office use cases
- Send only the signed page of a long contract: extract that page.
- Put together an application file: combine the form, your ID (you can convert the photos with images to PDF) and supporting documents into one file.
- Remove blank pages or appendices you don't need to send: extract everything except those.
- Reorder a document that was scanned in the wrong order: extract the pages in the right order.
Things to know
- Password-protected PDFs can't be merged or split without removing the protection first. Open them in your PDF reader, enter the password and save them without it (or print to PDF).
- Digital signatures: the visible signature stays, but the cryptographic validity of an electronic signature is lost once the document is modified. If you need to keep it, send the signed original untouched.
- Bookmarks and forms: combining documents from different sources may lose the side outline and fillable fields. That's normal for any merging tool.
- Sizes add up: the merged PDF weighs roughly the same as all the originals together.
Frequently asked questions
Is there a limit on files or size?
There's no fixed limit. The only limit is your device's memory; dozens of normal-sized documents are processed in seconds.
Does it work on a phone?
Yes. On Android and iPhone you can pick PDFs from the Files app or from cloud storage, and the result is saved to your downloads.
Can I compress a PDF to make it smaller?
Toolbrik doesn't have a PDF compressor yet. If the size comes from scanned photos, the most effective approach is to compress the images with the image compressor before creating the PDF.
Is quality lost when merging or splitting?
No. Pages are copied as they are, without rasterizing them or recompressing text or images.