Compress PDF for Email — Under Attachment Size Limits
Email attachment limits are the most common reason people need to compress PDFs. Gmail allows 25MB, Outlook 20MB, and most corporate email servers restrict to 10MB. This tool compresses your PDF in your browser — ideal for confidential documents like contracts, invoices, and reports that you don't want uploaded to third-party servers.
Drop a PDF here or click to browse
Single PDF file
All processing happens in your browser. No files are uploaded.
Tips & best practices
- Gmail: 25MB total attachment limit. Compress large PDFs to under 10MB to leave room for other attachments
- Outlook: 20MB limit. Corporate Exchange servers often restrict to 10MB — compress to under 5MB for safety
- Most PDFs can be reduced 50-80% without visible quality loss by recompressing embedded images
- Scanned documents are the largest PDFs — they often compress from 20MB+ to under 3MB
- If a single PDF exceeds limits even after compression, use our Split PDF tool to divide it into smaller files
- For recurring large PDFs, consider using our compress + merge workflow: compress individual files, then combine
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the maximum PDF size for email?
Gmail: 25MB total, Outlook/Hotmail: 20MB, Yahoo: 25MB, most corporate servers: 10-15MB. These limits apply to all attachments combined. A compressed PDF under 5MB is safe for virtually all email providers.
How much can a PDF be compressed?
Typical compression: scanned PDFs (20MB+ to 2-3MB, 80-90% reduction), image-heavy reports (10MB to 2-3MB, 70-80%), text-only PDFs (already small, 10-30% reduction). Results depend on the content type.
Will compression affect PDF quality?
Text, fonts, and vector graphics remain identical. Embedded images are recompressed at optimized quality settings. For most business documents, the difference is invisible at screen viewing sizes.
Is it safe to compress confidential PDFs online?
With brevtool, yes. Your PDF is compressed entirely in your browser — the file never leaves your device. This is critical for contracts, financial documents, medical records, and other sensitive attachments.
All processing happens in your browser. No files are uploaded to any server.