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Practical guide · Merge PDF

Assemble PDF pages in the right order

Put the files in order, remove the unwanted page and straighten the sideways one. This exercise uses five clearly labelled synthetic pages, so you can learn the controls without sharing a real document. Before sending the result, open the actual download and check its contents: a PDF that opens is not necessarily the PDF you intended.

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The idea, illustrated
A2 is sideways. That is a page setting, not an artistic statement.

Sample files for this exercise

These are made-up documents. Download the two PDFs, then select the saved files in the tool.

Your next steps

Step by step

  1. Download and select both PDFs

    Download source-a.pdf and source-b.pdf using the links above. Open Merge PDF and choose both files. Source A has two pages; source B has three.

  2. Move source B before A

    Under File order, use the up arrow beside source-b.pdf if needed so B appears above A. The page sequence now starts B1, B2, B3, A1, A2.

  3. Remove only page B2

    Under Review pages, find B2, labelled REMOVE / ENTFERNEN, and press its Remove button. Keep B1 and B3. Do not use Remove file, which removes the whole source.

  4. Turn A2 upright

    Find A2, the sideways last page from source-a.pdf. Press Rotate once: the tool turns it 90 degrees clockwise. Leave both flip buttons off.

  5. Merge the four retained pages

    Check the four retained pages in this order: B1, B3, A1, A2. A2 should now be upright. Press Merge PDFs, then Download PDF.

  6. Open and check the download

    Open the downloaded merged.pdf in your normal PDF reader. Check all four page markers, orientation and readable text before using the file.

A concrete example

Five source pages become four checked pages

Before

A: A1, A2 (sideways) · B: B1, B2, B3

After

B1, B3, A1, A2 · 4 upright pages

Move B before A, remove only B2 and rotate A2 clockwise once. The two downloadable sources and bilingual answer sheet are original synthetic teaching materials, available under CC0 1.0.

Open the tool for this exercise

Understand the details

Merge, compress or extract?

Merge joins pages from at least two PDFs. Use it for a cover sheet and an attachment, for example. It does not promise a smaller file or a target upload size. If the right pages are already together but the file is too large, inspect the separate PDF compression tool and its mode-specific trade-offs. Extracting pages from one file belongs in Split PDF.

This merger changes file order while keeping each source's retained pages in their original order. It does not interleave individual pages from different files. That is why this exercise moves the whole B file first, then excludes B2.

Why A2 needs just one rotation

A2 deliberately starts with a sideways page orientation. Its correction is one clockwise quarter turn, not a mirror. Horizontal and vertical flips reflect content, including text. The +90-degree indicator describes your additional edit; it does not mean the final page should still look sideways. Use the visible text as your check.

If you remove the wrong page, use Restore on that page. Reset page edits clears rotations, flips and removals; check those choices again before exporting. Changing the selection requires a fresh merge and download.

Check more than the page count

Start with the page count, then check which pages you have. Four wrong pages would still add up to four. Read the large marker on each exported page. B2 must be absent, and B1, B3, A1 and A2 must each appear once in that order. All four should be upright portrait pages. Try selecting text on A2; these samples contain actual text, not screenshots.

The exporter reopens the generated PDF and checks page count, page dimensions and rotations. That does not establish that you selected the intended content. This exercise is also tested against the actual merge engine and a separate PDF text reader; your own documents still need visual review in the application that will receive them.

When a source cannot be used

Select 2 to 10 files, at most 20 MiB and 200 source pages combined. Removing pages in the preview does not bypass those input limits. If a preview fails, inspect that page in its original PDF before exporting. A damaged or unsupported file may need a new export from its source application.

Password-protected PDFs, interactive forms and digital signatures are rejected. Keep a signed original intact; this workflow cannot preserve its digital signature. If appropriate for your task, obtain an unsigned working copy or flatten a form in a trusted editor. Pages containing links, comments or other annotations cannot be flipped here.

Keep the originals

The merger copies PDF pages without rebuilding them as page images. Bookmarks and other document-level features may nevertheless be lost. Removing a page is not secure redaction or a guarantee that hidden data is gone; the tool is not a malware scanner. Keep the sources and review the new copy. Processing happens locally in the tool workspace; this guide itself has no file input.