Unlock PDF
Remove password protection from PDFs you own.
or click to browse — supports PDF files up to 100MB
How to use
- 1 Drop or click to upload your file
- 2 Adjust options if shown
- 3 Click Run Tool
- 4 Download your result instantly
- ✓ Files up to 1GB
- ✓ Unlimited jobs/hour
- ✓ Batch processing
- ✓ Priority support
Files are processed securely and permanently deleted within 1 hour. We never store, read, or share your documents.
Why this works
Remove the password from a PDF you have legitimate access to \u2014 the one your bank sends every month, the one a colleague sent with the password in a separate email. Requires the original password.
Unlock removes the open-password from an encrypted PDF you can already open. The most common case is repetitive: your bank, your utility, or your payroll provider emails a password-protected statement every month, you enter the password every time you open it, and you\u2019d like the local archived copy to just open without the password prompt. Unlock makes that one-time conversion.
We require the original password. Without it, the file cannot be decrypted \u2014 that\u2019s the entire point of encryption. PDFRun does not crack, brute-force, or bypass passwords. If you\u2019ve lost the password to your own PDF and it\u2019s mission-critical, contact the document\u2019s original issuer (your bank, your IT department, the document\u2019s sender) for a fresh copy. We can\u2019t recover passwords.
When you unlock a PDF with the correct password, we decrypt the document and re-save it without encryption. The output is bit-identical to the original page content; only the encryption layer is removed. Form fields, signatures, OCR text, annotations all survive intact.
A quick legal note: only unlock PDFs you have the right to. Removing password protection from someone else\u2019s document without their authorisation may be illegal under copyright or computer-misuse laws in your jurisdiction. PDFRun has no way to verify ownership; you\u2019re responsible for using the tool ethically.
The password is used once during decryption and immediately discarded \u2014 we don\u2019t store passwords, log them, or pass them to any third party. If you need to put a password back on the file later (e.g. you want a permanent local copy but want to share an unlocked version specifically), use the Protect tool to add a fresh password.
How it works
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1Upload your protected PDFDrop the password-protected PDF into the upload box.
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2Enter the passwordType the password the document was protected with. The password field is not stored anywhere on our side.
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3Run the unlockPress Unlock. If the password is correct, the job finishes in 1\u20132 seconds.
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4Download the unlocked PDFThe output opens without a password prompt. Page content is identical to the original.
Real-world uses
Anyone with monthly statements
Bank, utility, or payroll PDFs that arrive password-protected every month \u2014 unlock the archived copy once so future opens skip the prompt.
Bookkeepers
Receive password-protected invoices from clients; unlock and re-file in the unprotected accounting archive.
IT teams
Decommission old protected document caches where the password is documented and re-protection is no longer needed.
Researchers
Datasets shared as password-protected PDFs need to be unlocked once before being run through a text-extraction pipeline.
Common questions
Can you unlock a PDF without the password?
No. PDF encryption is real cryptography \u2014 AES-128 or AES-256. Without the correct password, the document cannot be decrypted by anyone, including us. If you\u2019ve lost the password, ask the original issuer for a fresh copy.
Is this legal?
For PDFs you own or have authorised access to, yes. Removing protection from documents you don\u2019t have the right to may violate copyright or computer-misuse laws in your jurisdiction. PDFRun has no way to verify ownership; you\u2019re responsible for using the tool ethically.
Will form fields and signatures survive?
Yes. Unlocking only removes the encryption layer. Form fields, signatures, OCR layers, annotations, and page content are bit-identical to the original after unlocking.
Do you store the password I enter?
No. The password is used once during decryption and immediately discarded. We don\u2019t log, store, or transmit it elsewhere.
Can I re-protect with a different password later?
Yes. Use the Protect tool on the unlocked output with whatever new password you choose.
What encryption strengths do you support unlocking?
Both common standards: AES-128 (the default for most PDF generators) and AES-256 (used by Adobe Acrobat\u2019s high-security setting). Both decrypt cleanly with the correct password.