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Many lecturers share their slides as a PDF. Easy to read, but awkward for taking notes. Convert the PDF to PowerPoint and you can type your own notes with every slide, highlight text and reorder or delete slides.
Step by step
- Open PDF to PowerPoint and choose the PDF of your lecture.
- Pick a mode (see below).
- Click Convert to PowerPoint and download the file. Every page of the PDF becomes one slide.
- Open the file in PowerPoint, Keynote or Google Slides and type your notes in the notes pane below each slide.
Editable text or identical layout?
Editable text turns every block of text into its own text box, in the same place as in the PDF. Tables become real tables and bold or italic text is kept. Choose this if you want to change, highlight or copy text.
Identical layout turns every page into a picture. The slide looks like the original, but the text is not editable. Choose this if you only want to add notes and don’t need to change the slide itself.
Several lectures in one presentation
Each PDF becomes its own .pptx file. Do you want one presentation per subject? Merge the PDFs first with Merge PDF, in the order of the lectures, and then convert the merged file.
Handy ways to study with it
- Notes pane: type what the lecturer says during the lecture, right below the slide it belongs to.
- Print with notes: in PowerPoint, choose Notes Pages when printing. You get the slide with your notes underneath, one per sheet.
- Hide slides you don’t need for the exam, instead of deleting them.
- Search: with Editable text you can search the whole course for a term.
What doesn’t work
- Scanned slides stay pictures. This tool does no text recognition (OCR), so the text in a scan is not editable. You can first make a scan searchable with OCR PDF.
- Handouts with several slides per page stay that way: each PDF page becomes one slide, so a page with six small slides becomes one slide with six small pictures or text boxes. Ask for the original slides if you can.
- A paragraph that ran across columns can end up split over several text boxes.
On complex pages with many columns or irregular tables, the order of the text may differ. The tool warns you when that is likely. In that case choose Identical layout, certainly for an exam or an official document.
Frequently asked questions
Is my course uploaded when I convert it?
No. The conversion happens in your own browser. The PDF and the PowerPoint file aren't uploaded.
Can I convert the presentation back to PDF?
Yes, in PowerPoint, Keynote or Google Slides via Save as or Download as PDF. Want your notes in it too? In PowerPoint, choose Notes Pages when you print or save as PDF.
Which programs open the file?
You get a .pptx file. It opens in Microsoft PowerPoint, Google Slides, Apple Keynote and LibreOffice Impress.