A scan with two inches of white border, a slide deck exported with too much padding, a page that needs to fit a template exactly - all the same fix. This trims every page down to the content that matters, either automatically or by margins you set yourself.
How to crop pdf
Upload your PDFChoose the file you want to crop.
Pick a modeAuto-detect finds the actual content on every page and trims to it. Manual margins let you remove an exact amount from each edge.
Check the previewSee exactly what page one will look like before committing to anything.
DownloadEvery page is cropped to the same box, so the whole document stays consistent. Your file is gone the instant your download is ready.
What you can do
- Trim the wide white border a flatbed scanner leaves around a page
- Cut a slide deck's PDF export down to just the slide content
- Remove printer registration marks or bleed area before sharing a proof
- Fit a page to an exact size a form or template requires
- Tighten up a screenshot-heavy document where every page has excess margin
What happens to your file
Your files are never stored. Nothing is parked, queued, or kept — the moment your download is ready, it's gone, and no one ever sees it.
Plenty of online tools store your file on their servers and delete it later. PDF Cubby doesn't keep it at all — there's nothing left behind to clean up afterward.
Features
- Auto-detect - finds the real content on every page and trims to it, with a small padding so nothing touches the edge
- Manual margins - remove an exact number of points from the top, bottom, left and right
- One crop box for the whole document, so pages stay a consistent size
- Free, no sign-up, no watermark
- Never stored - files are gone the moment you are done
Tips
- Cropping a scan before OCR? Crop first - OCR reads the content faster without a border to scan past.
- Need the file smaller too? Run Compress afterward.
- Only need part of the document? Extract Pages first, then crop just those.
Frequently asked questions
- What does "auto-detect" actually look at?
- It measures the real extent of the text, drawings and images on every page and computes one crop box that fits the widest content across the whole document, plus a small padding. It does not guess - if a page turns out to have no detectable content, cropping falls back to manual margins instead of guessing.
- Will different pages end up different sizes?
- No, by design - one crop box is applied to the whole document so every page stays the same size. A smaller page in a mixed-size document is protected from being cropped tighter than its own edges.
- Can I set an exact margin instead?
- Yes - switch to manual margins and enter the amount to remove from each of the four edges, in points (72 points = 1 inch).
- Does cropping delete content, or just hide it?
- It sets the page's visible area (its crop box). What is outside that box is no longer shown or printed, though the underlying page data is not re-rendered - this is the standard, reversible way PDF viewers and printers already handle a page's boundaries.
- Do I need an account?
- No. Cropping is free with no sign-up and no watermark.
- Are my files kept anywhere?
- No. Your PDF is cropped and discarded the instant your download is ready.