pdftl

pdftl ("PDF tackle") is a CLI tool for PDF manipulation written in Python. It is intended to be a command-line compatible extension of the venerable pdftk.

Leveraging the power of pikepdf (qpdf) and other modern libraries, it offers advanced capabilities like cropping, chopping, regex text replacement, adding text and arbitrary content stream injection.

Quick start

pipx install pdftl[full]

# merge, crop to letter paper, rotate last page and output with encryption with one command
pdftl A=a.pdf B=b.pdf cat A1-5 B2-end \
    --- crop '4-8,12(letter)' \
    --- rotate endright \
    output out.pdf owner_pw foo user_pw bar encrypt_aes256

Key features and pdftk compatibility

• Familiar syntax: Command-line compatible with pdftk. Verified against Mike Haertl's php-pdftk test suite and the pdftk-java test suite logic, so s/pdftk/pdftl/ should result in working scripts.
• Pipelining: Chain multiple operations in a single command using ---.
• Performant: pdftl seems faster than pdftk-java for many operations (based on informal benchmarks). Reason: pdftl mostly drives pikepdf which drives qpdf, a fast C++ library.
• Extra/enhanced operations and features such as zooming pages, smart merging preserving links and outlines, cropping/chopping up pages, text extraction, optimizing images.
• Modern security: Supports AES-256 encryption and modern permission flags out of the box.
• Content editing: Find & replace text via regular expressions, inject raw PDF operators, or overlay dynamic text.

pdftl maintains command-line compatibility with pdftk while introducing features required for modern PDF workflows.

Feature	pdftk (Legacy)	pdftl (Modern)
Pipelining	❌ (Requires temp files)	✅ Native (Chain ops with ---)
Encryption	⚠️ (Obsolete RC4)	✅ AES-256 Support
Syntax	Standard	✅ Compatible Extension
Page Geometry	❌	✅ Crop to fit, Zoom, & Chop
Pipelined Logic	❌	✅ Rotate + Stamp in one command
Plugins	❌	✅ Custom operations/mutation scripts written in Python
Installation	Often complex binary	✅ Simple pipx install pdftl
Performance	Variable	✅ Powered by pikepdf/qpdf
Link Integrity	⚠️ Often breaks TOC/Links	✅ Preserves internal cross-refs
Shell Completion	❌	✅ bash, zsh and powershell
Help	⚠️ Basic (manpage)	✅ Self-documenting: pdftl help <operation/option/topic/tag>

Installation

Install pipx, and then:

pipx install pdftl[full]

A simple pip install pdftl[full] install is also supported.

Note: The [full] install includes ocrmypdf for image optimization, reportlab for text generation, pypdfium2 for text extraction and robust flattening, and pyHanko for cryptographic signature functionality. Omit [full] to omit those features and dependencies.

Key features

📄 Standard operations

• Combine: cat, shuffle (interleave pages from multiple docs).
• Split: burst (split into single pages), delete pages.
• Metadata: dump_data, update_info, attach_files, unpack_files.
• Watermarking: stamp / background (single page), multistamp / multibackground.

✂️ Geometry & splitting

• Rotate: rotate pages (absolute or relative).
• Crop: crop to margins or standard paper sizes (e.g., "A4").
• Chop: chop pages into grids or rows (e.g., split a scanned spread into two pages).
• Shift, scale and spin page content inside the page boundaries using place.

📝 Forms & annotations

• Forms: fill_form, generate_fdf, dump_data_fields.
• Annotations: modify_annots (surgical edits to link properties, colors, borders), delete_annots, dump_annots.

🔐 Security

• Decryption: using input_pw.
• Encryption: using owner_pw, user_pw and encrypt_aes256, optionally setting permissions with allow.
• Signatures: add secure signatures using sign_key and sign_cert. List and verify signatures using dump_signatures (powered by pyHanko).

🛠️ Advanced

• Text replacement: replace text in content streams using regular expressions (experimental).
• Code injection: inject raw PDF operators at the head/tail of content streams.
• Optimization: optimize_images (smart compression via OCRmyPDF).
• Dynamic text: add_text supports Bates stamping and can add page numbers, filenames, timestamps, etc.
• Cleanup: normalize content streams, linearize for web viewing.
• Plugins: write your own custom operation in Python, save to ~/.config/pdftl/operations (*nix) or %APPDATA%\pdftl\config (Windows) and you can use it in pdftl, just like the built-in operations. And you can mutate_content using simple Python scripts.

Examples

For more than 100 other examples: pdftl help examples.

Concatenation

# Merge two files
pdftl in1.pdf in2.pdf cat output combined.pdf

# Now with in2.pdf zoomed in
pdftl A=in1.pdf B=in2.pdf cat A Bz1 output combined2.pdf

Geometry

# Take pages 1-5, rotate them 90 degrees East, and crop to A4
pdftl in.pdf cat 1-5east --- crop "(a4)" output out.pdf

Pipelining

You can chain operations without intermediate files using ---:

# Burst a file, but rotate and stamp every page first
pdftl in.pdf rotate south \
  --- stamp watermark.pdf \
  --- burst output page_%04d.pdf

Forms and metadata

# Fill a form and flatten it (make it non-editable)
pdftl form.pdf fill_form data.fdf flatten output signed.pdf

Modify annotations

# Change all Highlight annotations on odd pages to Red
pdftl docs.pdf modify_annots "odd/Highlight(C=[1 0 0])" output red_notes.pdf

Modify content

# Add a watermark, the pdftk way
pdftl in.pdf stamp watermark.pdf output marked1.pdf

# Add an obnoxious semi-transparent red watermark on odd pages only
pdftl in.pdf add_text 'odd/YOUR AD HERE/(position=mid-center, font=Helvetica-Bold, size=72, rotate=45, color=1 0 0 0.5)' output with_ads.pdf

# Add Bates numbering starting at 000121
# Result: DEF-000121, DEF-000122, ...
pdftl in.pdf \
  add_text "/DEF-{page+120:06d}/(position=bottom-center, offset-y=10)" \
  output bates.pdf

# Content stream replacment with regular expressions (YMMV)
# Change black to red
pdftl in.pdf replace '/0 0 0 (RG|rg)/1 0 0 \1/' output redder.pdf

Python API

While pdftl is primarily a CLI tool, it also exposes a robust Python API for integrating PDF workflows into your scripts. It supports both a Functional interface (similar to the CLI) and a Fluent interface (for method chaining).

from pdftl import pipeline

# Chain operations fluently without saving intermediate files
(
    pipeline("input.pdf")
    .rotate("right")
    .stamp("watermark.pdf")
    .save("output.pdf")
)

See the API Tutorial for more details.

Operations and options

Operation	Description
add_text	Add user-specified text strings to PDF pages
attach_files	Attach files to the output PDF
background	Use a 1-page PDF as the background for each page
burst	Split a single PDF into individual page files
cat	Concatenate pages from input PDFs into a new PDF
chop	Chop pages into multiple smaller pieces
crop	Crop pages
delete	Delete pages from an input PDF
delete_annots	Delete annotation info
dump_annots	Dump annotation info
dump_data	Metadata, page and bookmark info (XML-escaped)
dump_data_annots	Dump annotation info in pdftk style
dump_data_fields	Print PDF form field data with XML-style escaping
dump_data_fields_utf8	Print PDF form field data in UTF-8
dump_data_utf8	Metadata, page and bookmark info (in UTF-8)
dump_dests	Print PDF named destinations data to the console
dump_files	List file attachments
dump_layers	Dump layer info (JSON)
dump_signatures	List and validate digital signatures
dump_text	Print PDF text data to the console or a file
fill_form	Fill a PDF form
filter	Do nothing (the default if <operation> is absent)
generate_fdf	Generate an FDF file containing PDF form data
inject	Inject code at start or end of page content streams
insert	Insert blank pages
modify_annots	Modify properties of existing annotations
move	Move pages to a new location
multibackground	Use multiple pages as backgrounds
multistamp	Stamp multiple pages onto an input PDF
mutate_content	Mutate page content streams using a user-supplied Python script
normalize	Reformat page content streams
optimize_images	Optimize images
place	Shift, scale, and spin page content
replace	Regex replacement on page content streams
render	Render PDF pages as images
rotate	Rotate pages in a PDF
shuffle	Interleave pages from multiple input PDFs
stamp	Stamp a 1-page PDF onto each page of an input PDF
unpack_files	Unpack file attachments
update_info	Update PDF metadata from dump_data instructions
update_info_utf8	Update PDF metadata from dump_data_utf8 instructions

Option	Description
allow <perm>	Specify permissions for encrypted files
compress	Compress output file streams (default)
drop_info	Discard document-level info metadata
drop_xfa	Discard form XFA data if present
drop_xmp	Discard document-level XMP metadata
encrypt_128bit	Use 128 bit encryption (obsolete, maybe insecure)
encrypt_40bit	Use 40 bit encryption (obsolete, highly insecure)
encrypt_aes128	Use 128 bit AES encryption (maybe obsolete)
encrypt_aes256	Use 256 bit AES encryption
flatten	Flatten all annotations
keep_final_id	Copy final input PDF's ID metadata to output
keep_first_id	Copy first input PDF's ID metadata to output
linearize	Linearize output file(s)
no_encrypt_metadata	Leave metadata unencrypted
need_appearances	Set a form rendering flag in the output PDF
output <file>	The output file path, or a template for burst
owner_pw <pw>	Set owner password and encrypt output
replacement_font <file>	Replace the font used for all form fields with a TTF file
sign_cert <file>	Path to certificate PEM
sign_field <name>	Signature field name (default: Signature1)
sign_key <file>	Path to private key PEM
sign_pass_env <var>	Environment variable with sign_cert passphrase
sign_pass_prompt	Prompt for sign_cert passphrase
uncompress	Disable compression of output file streams
user_pw <pw>	Set user password and encrypt output
verbose	Turn on verbose output

Links

• License: This project is licensed under the Mozilla Public License 2.0.
• Changelog: CHANGELOG.md.
• Documentation: pdftl.readthedocs.io.