How to remove or delete pages from a PDF on a Mac

With PDF Unlimited (free)

1. Open Pages mode

   Open the PDF in PDF Unlimited and click Pages in the toolbar mode switcher. Every page appears as a thumbnail in a grid.

2. Select the pages

   Click a page to select it, and ⌘-click to add more.

3. Delete them

   Delete the selection. The remaining pages close up the gap.

4. Undo if needed

   Deleted the wrong one? ⌘Z brings it back.

5. Save

   Save the PDF. To keep the original intact, save a copy instead.

With Preview, built into macOS

1. Show thumbnails

   Open the PDF in Preview and choose View > Thumbnails, or View > Contact Sheet for a bigger grid.

2. Select and delete

   Select the page or pages, then press the Delete key or choose Edit > Delete.

3. Save

   Preview saves automatically. Use File > Duplicate first if you want to keep the original.

Remove pages or extract them?

If you want to remove three pages from a 40-page file, delete them. If you want to keep three pages from a 40-page file, it is faster to select those three and extract them to a new PDF instead. That is covered in how to split a PDF.

Things to know before you delete

A few behaviours worth knowing:

• Annotations, highlights and signatures on a deleted page are removed with it.
• Preview saves changes automatically, so a deleted page may be gone for good once you close the window. Duplicate first.
• If the PDF is password protected with editing restrictions, you will need the owner password to change pages.
• Bookmarks in the outline that pointed to deleted pages may stop working.

Deleting a page is not redacting it

Removing a page removes it from the document. But if you only need to hide part of a page, like an account number, deleting the whole page is overkill and covering it with a black box is not enough. Use true redaction, which removes the content underneath.

While you are in Pages mode

Pages mode does more than delete. Rotate scans that came in sideways, duplicate a page you need twice, insert a blank page for notes, or drag in pages from another file to combine PDFs. If the file is still large after the cleanup, compress it.

Cleaning up a scanned document

Scans are where page deletion earns its keep. A typical clean-up pass takes a minute in Pages mode:

• Delete the blank backs of single-sided pages that went through a duplex scanner.
• Delete duplicate pages from the time the feeder grabbed two sheets and you rescanned.
• Rotate pages that came in sideways or upside down.
• Drag pages into the right order if the stack got shuffled.
• Run OCR so the result is searchable, then compress it for email.

Questions