For architects and professionals who need to work with documents efficiently and confidentially. Compress drawings, add scale bars and title blocks, resize pages to ISO formats, add watermarks and more.
Your files never leave your browser — 100% local processing
No — nobody. Not us, not any third party. Every operation runs entirely inside your browser using JavaScript, so your PDF never leaves your device from the moment you open it to the moment you download the result. This is not just a privacy policy: the site has no backend server at all, making it technically impossible for your files to be transmitted or seen by anyone else.
Any modern Chromium-based browser (Chrome 90+, Edge 90+, Brave) or Firefox 90+ works well. Safari 16+ on macOS and iOS is also supported for most tools. For the Compress tool, which uses a Ghostscript WebAssembly engine, a recent Chromium browser gives the best results. If Ghostscript fails to load, the tool automatically falls back to a lighter pdf-lib compression.
There are no server-imposed limits because everything runs locally. Practical limits depend on your device's RAM. Files up to ~150 MB are handled without issues on most modern computers. Very large files (scanned plans at 300 dpi, for example) may be slow on low-memory devices. If a tool runs out of memory the browser will show an error message — you can try reducing the file first with the Compress tool.
Yes, this is the intended workflow. After any operation completes, click ↩ Keep working with this version to promote the result as the active file. Every subsequent tool will work on that modified version. A green banner at the top of the tool panel tracks your modification history so you always know which version you are working on.
It uses Ghostscript compiled to WebAssembly, running entirely in your browser. You can choose from four presets — Screen (72 dpi, smallest), eBook (150 dpi), Printer (300 dpi), and Prepress (high quality) — or switch to Custom mode to set your own DPI and JPEG quality. The presets map directly to Ghostscript's -dPDFSETTINGS options. If the WASM engine fails to initialise (for example, in some older browsers) the tool falls back to a metadata-strip compression using pdf-lib.
You enter the drawing scale (e.g. 1:100) and the tool automatically selects a "nice" bar length — a round number of metres or feet that represents roughly 20% of the page width at that scale. For example, on an A1 sheet at 1:100 the bar will be 10 m or 15 m, not 12.37 m. The bar is always drawn in PDF coordinate space with full rotation compensation so it appears correctly even on pages that have a 90°, 180° or 270° rotation flag. You can fine-tune the exact position with the X/Y offset controls (in % of page width/height).
Five visual styles are available: Classic (alternating filled/empty), Hatch (hatched dark segments), Staggered (bars alternate above/below a centre line), Dots (thin line with dots at each division), and Ticks (thin line with vertical ticks only). Any colour can be applied to all bar elements at once.
It adds an architectural title block to the bottom-right corner of your pages. The block width scales with the ISO paper format (A4 → 36 mm, A0 → 77 mm) and the height adjusts dynamically to fit all content without overflow. Fields include Project name, Site address, Drawing content (multi-line), Plan type and number, Scale, Date, Client signature, Designer signature, a north arrow (rotatable by degree input), and Project No. All text is automatically uppercased. Long field values wrap to multiple lines, and names in the signature area shrink automatically to fit their column.
White layer draws a filled white polygon directly on the page content stream. The original content is covered visually but remains in the file — it can potentially be recovered by someone with the right tools. Use this when you want a reversible, lightweight cover (e.g. to overwrite before printing).
Flatten page rasterizes the entire page to a bitmap at the chosen DPI and reconstructs it as a single image, permanently destroying all underlying vector content and text within the patch. This is the correct choice when you need to irreversibly redact sensitive information before sharing a file.
Yes. Use Reorder & Remove Pages to drag pages into the order you want and remove any you don't need, then click ↩ Keep working with this version. After that, open the Split PDF tool — it will show the reordered pages and let you click the gaps where you want to split.
All tools are free with no account required and no file limits. Scalebar PDF Tools is the only browser-based suite specifically built for architects — combining general PDF utilities with tools unique to architectural practice, such as metric and imperial graphic scale bars with multiple styles, ISO-format title blocks with north arrows and signature fields, and a coordinate-aware patch/redact tool that handles rotated drawing sheets correctly. The site is sustained by a small, non-intrusive Carbon Ads unit — a single ad served exclusively to technical and design audiences (no tracking pixels, no retargeting). If you find the tools useful, you can also leave a one-time tip via the support button. Neither is required to use any feature.
✓Working on modified file
Compress PDF
Uses Ghostscript compiled to WebAssembly for real compression — significantly more effective than metadata-only approaches.
The engine (~30 MB) loads once on first use and is cached for the session.
Screen72 DPI · smallest file digital viewing only
eBook150 DPI · good balance email & web sharing
Printer300 DPI · high quality office printing
Prepress300 DPI · color-safe professional print
Custommanual DPI & quality control
The Ghostscript engine will be downloaded the first time you compress a file (~30 MB).
Convert pages to images
Text watermark
Logo watermark
The logo is automatically converted to grayscale before embedding. Select an image of your logo.
📁 Choose image…
Resize to standard format
Rescales each page to the selected ISO or standard format, fitting the content within the new dimensions.
Reorder & remove pages
Drag thumbnails to reorder. Check the box on any page to mark it for removal.
Graphic scale bar
Adds an architectural scale bar to every page. Page rotation is automatically detected
and compensated so the bar always appears in the correct visual position.
Fine-tune offset — as % of visual page width/height (negative moves left/down):
Example: X = +5 moves the bar 5% of the page width to the right. Y = −2 moves it 2% downward.
Graphic scale bar (feet)
Adds an imperial scale bar in feet. Page rotation is automatically detected
and compensated so the bar always appears in the correct visual position.
Fine-tune offset — as % of visual page width/height (negative moves left/down):
Example: X = +5 moves the bar 5% of the page width to the right. Y = −2 moves it 2% downward.
Split PDF
Load thumbnails, then click the gap between any two pages to mark a split point.
Each section will be exported as a separate PDF.
Merge PDFs
Upload multiple PDF files. Drag the preview cards to reorder them, then merge into one document.
📁 Choose PDF files (multiple allowed)…
Image to PDF
Convert one or more images into a PDF — one page per image, sized to fit.
📁 Choose images (JPG, PNG, WebP)…
Patch / Redact
Draw a white polygon over any area of a page to cover unwanted content.
Title block (viñeta)
Adds an architectural title block to the bottom-right corner. Width adapts to page format, height adjusts automatically to content. Empty fields are left blank.
OTHER TOOLS — same file
Patch editor|Click to place vertices. Click the blue dot (or near the first point) to close the polygon.|
Vertices: 0 |
Snap radius: 20px — click near the blue first-point dot to close the polygon.