Some PDF jobs are the same three or four steps every time. Stamp "CONFIDENTIAL" on it, shrink it, put a password on it, send it. Doing that through three separate tools means three uploads, three downloads and three files called something like compressed-watermarked-report (2).pdf.
Workflows chains those steps together. You set them up once, save the list, and from then on each file is one click on "Run workflow". It runs in your browser, so the file isn't uploaded, and passwords are never saved.
What a workflow can and can't do
There are five step types, added from the "Add a step:" row:
- "Convert to grayscale" turns every page black and white.
- "Rotate 90°" turns all pages "90° clockwise", "180°" or "90° counter-clockwise".
- "Add watermark" stamps faint diagonal text, "CONFIDENTIAL" unless you type something else.
- "Compress" makes the file smaller, with a "Method" of "Automatic" or "Lossless only".
- "Password protect" locks the file with a password using AES 256-bit encryption.
You can add the same step more than once (two rotations, say), reorder steps with the up and down arrows, and remove any of them.
It's worth being clear about what "automate" means here. A workflow handles one PDF per run. There's no batch mode for a folder of files and no schedule. What it saves you is the setup: the right steps, in the right order, with the right settings, every time. For a weekly report that gets the same treatment, that's most of the work.
Building and saving your first workflow
- Open Workflows and add a PDF.
- Under "Add a step:", click the steps you want in the order you want them.
- Fill in each step's settings: the rotation, the watermark text, the compression method, or the password (typed twice, the second time in "Repeat the password").
- Type a name in "Workflow name" and click "Save".
- Click "Run workflow". The button shows progress like "Step 2 of 4: Compress...", and the result is saved as workflow-yourfile.pdf.
Next time, open the tool, add the new file and click the workflow's name under "Saved workflows" to load it. Up to 30 workflows are kept.
Saved workflows live in this browser on this device, and nowhere else. Clearing your browser data removes them, and they won't show up on your phone. To move one, or to give it to a colleague, use "Export .json", which downloads the steps as a small file, and "Import .json" on the other end. The password is left out of both. If your workflow ends with "Password protect", you type the password each time you run it, which is how it should be.
Why password protection always runs last
Once a PDF is encrypted, the other steps can't open it without the password, and asking for it again halfway through would defeat the point. So "Password protect" is pinned to the end of the list. If you add another step after it, that step is slotted in before it, and you'll see a note saying so. You can only have one password step.
This mirrors what you'd do by hand anyway. Encryption scrambles the contents of the file, so anything that wants to change pages has to happen before it. The guide on password protecting a PDF explains what the open password actually protects.
The two steps that turn pages into pictures
Most of the steps are light touches. Rotation only changes a flag on each page that tells the reader which way up to show it, so nothing is redrawn. The watermark adds one line of text to each page, gray at 25% opacity, sized to the page.
Two steps are heavier, and they're the ones to understand before you build anything.
"Convert to grayscale" renders every page as an image (about 144 dpi, saved as JPEG) and builds a new PDF from those images. The result looks right, but the text can't be selected, searched or copied any more, and links and form fields don't survive. If you want selectable text, use the separate Grayscale tool instead, which changes the colors without redrawing anything.
"Compress" on "Automatic" first tries a lossless rewrite of the file's internal structure. If that saves less than 10%, it renders the pages as JPEG images at 108 dpi and keeps whichever version is smaller. On a text-heavy PDF that can mean you get back a smaller file whose text is no longer text. "Lossless only" never redraws pages, so text stays selectable, but it usually saves less.
Getting the order right
The order changes the result, so a few rules of thumb:
- Rotate first. It's lossless and doesn't care what comes after.
- Watermark before grayscale if you want the watermark baked into the page image so it can't be lifted off as text. Watermark after grayscale if you want it to stay as real text.
- Don't follow grayscale with Compress on "Automatic". The grayscale pages are already JPEG images, and squeezing them into JPEG a second time at a lower resolution makes text look soft. Use "Lossless only" there, or skip compression.
- Password protect goes last, and the tool enforces it.
A typical "send to a client" workflow is rotate (if needed), "Add watermark" with the client's name, "Compress" on "Lossless only", then "Password protect". Text stays selectable, and the file is locked.
When a step fails, and when to use the full tools
If a step can't finish, the run stops and tells you which one, for example "Step 3 (Compress) failed", and that step is marked in the list. The original file is untouched, so fix the setting or remove the step and run again.
The workflow steps are deliberately simple versions of the full tools. The watermark is always diagonal and centred, with no choice of font, color or position; Watermark has all of that. Rotation applies to every page; Rotate PDF can turn single pages. Password protect sets an open password only, with no permission settings; Protect PDF has those.
Before you rely on a saved workflow, run it on one real file and open the result in a different app, such as Preview on a Mac or Adobe Acrobat Reader. Check the watermark reads well, try selecting a line of text, and open it with the password once. Then it's safe to stop thinking about it.
Also useful: Watermark · Protect PDF
