Digital Corps

Reducing PDF Size for Design Reviews

Quick Tip!

Make sure to reduce the file size of your PDFs before you submit them to review. This will allow for quicker upload and download times, save storage space, and will make collaboration and reviews run more efficiently as a whole.

Helpful Staff for this Topic

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As a Design Team member, you will have to submit many PDFs for review. PDFs allow everyone at the Corps to easily view your work without having to worry about any changes made during the review process. However, PDFs often have very large file sizes.

There are a few easy ways to reduce the file size of your PDF without losing the quality of your work. This will allow for faster upload and download speeds, more efficient collaboration between Corps employees and clients, and will save storage space on the Corps’ OneDrive account.

Reduce File Size Without Losing Quality

Before you reduce the size of your PDF file, it is important to note that you do not have to give up the quality of your work. The export and save options you use will reduce the size of images and other elements used in the PDF without diminishing the resolution. There are three easy ways to reduce the size of your PDF:

Adobe Illustrator

You can save your PDF directly from Illustrator and use the save setting to reduce the file size.

1. Go to “File > Save as” in the Illustrator menu.
2. Select Adobe PDF for the file format.
3. Under the General tab, select the Adobe PDF Preset drop down and select “High Quality Print.”
4. Turn off the option called Preserve Illustrator Editing Capabilities.
5. Go to the Compression tab.
6. Under the Color Images and Greyscale Images compression options, change the leading ppi values to 150 ppi.
7. Make sure that the Compress Text and Line Art option is selected.
8. Save your file.

If your exported PDF is still too large of a file size, you can re-export the file and choose “high” for the image quality options under the Compression tab rather than “maximum.”

Adobe InDesign

When you export a PDF from Adobe InDesign, you will follow similar steps as you would in Illustrator.

1. Go to “File > Export” in the InDesign menu.
2. Select Adobe PDF Print for the file format.
3. Under the General tab, select the Adobe PDF Preset drop down and select “High Quality Print.”
4. Go to the Compression tab.
5. Under the Color Images and Greyscale Images compression options, change the top ppi values to 150 ppi.
6. Make sure that the Compress Text and Line Art option is selected.
7. Export your file.

If your exported PDF is still too large of a file size, you can re-export the file and choose “high” for the image quality options under the Compression tab rather than “maximum.”

Saving Out PDFs From Other Programs

Miro

1. Select the artboards or assets that you will export.
2. Navigate to the export menu in the menu bar.
3. Select “Save as PDF.”

Figma

1. Select the artboards or assets that you will export.
2. Navigate to the menu bar on the right, and scroll down to the export menu.
3. Select “PDF” for the file type, and export your files.

Whimsical

1. Select the artboards or assets that you will export.
2. Select the Paper Airplane in the menu bar at the top of the screen.
3. Export your files as PNGs.
4. Combine the PNG files as a PDF in Adobe Acrobat.

Adobe Acrobat and Other Programs

If you need to submit a PDF for review which contains work from a program outside of the Adobe Creative Cloud, you can used Adobe Acrobat to create and reduce the size of the PDF. You can use Acrobat for programs such as Figma, Whimsical, Miro, and more.

1. Export or save your work from the original program.
2. Launch Adobe Acrobat.
3. Got to “file > create > combine files into a single PDF.”
4. Add the files to the combine files menu.
5. Rearrange the files so that they are in the correct order for the PDF and click combine.
6. Once your file is created, click on Tools in the tab to the left of the PDF’s tab.
7. Scroll and select the Optimize PDF tool.
8. Return to the tab containing the PDF.
9. Select Advanced Optimization in the Optimize PDF toolbar.
10. Under the images tab, navigate to the Color Images and Greyscale Images compression options, and change the leading ppi values to 150 ppi.
11. Change the image quality to maximum.
12. Save your file.

If your file is still too large, or the resolution is decreased too much, you can use a process called “flattening.” Flattening options can be found under the Advanced Optimization tool. These settings will merge certain elements within the PDF to one single layer in order to reduce file size.

It is important to note that there is no set standard for PDF file sizes. Typically, if you send a PDF attached to an email, it should be no larger than 20 megabytes. However, the Corps usually will share files with clients through a OneDrive link since many of the PDFs shared are larger than 20 megabytes, even after file size reduction. It is still beneficial for you to pay attention to the file size before you submit a PDF to review.

If you follow these steps, you will be able to easily reduce the sizes of your PDF files. Remember to check the PDF file size before submitting your next review!

Quick Tip!

You can learn about all of the different optimization settings in Adobe Acrobat by visiting Adobe’s Website.