Recover Broken PDFs —
Browser-Based, No Upload

What can be recovered?

Honest about what works and what doesn't.

Frequently asked questions

• Can a corrupted PDF be recovered?+
  Often yes. If the corruption is structural — broken cross-reference tables, invalid object references, or missing EOF markers — the PDF can usually be rebuilt. Recovery shows you exactly which pages were saved and which were too damaged.
• Why won't my PDF open?+
  PDFs fail to open due to incomplete downloads, damaged storage media, broken cross-reference tables, corrupted metadata, or failed exports from other software. These structural issues can often be fixed by rebuilding the PDF structure locally in your browser.
• How does browser-based PDF recovery work?+
  The tool uses pdf-lib with aggressive recovery flags: throwOnInvalidObject:false which causes it to skip invalid objects instead of crashing. It rebuilds the cross-reference table, extracts valid pages, and saves them into a new clean PDF — all without uploading your file.
• Is my PDF uploaded to a server?+
  No. Recovery happens entirely in your browser using JavaScript. Your file never leaves your device — no upload, no server processing, no data collection. PDFs often contain sensitive information; this ensures complete privacy.
• What does the recovery percentage mean?+
  It shows what fraction of the total pages were successfully extracted. A 100% recovery means all pages were readable. Lower percentages indicate some pages had damage that prevented them from being included in the output.
• What should I do if recovery fails?+
  If recovery fails completely, the PDF likely has missing binary data that cannot be regenerated. Try re-downloading the original from its source, check if you have a backup copy, or contact the sender for a fresh copy of the file.

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