Split a PDF online — one file per page or custom ranges

Drop your PDF into iFillPDF, pick a mode (one file per page, or custom ranges like 1-5, 10, 15-20), and download every part — no signup, no credit card, no email address asked. Adobe Acrobat online forces a sign-in after upload, pdfFiller forces a full account, and Smallpdf caps the free tier at 2 split tasks per day. We cap at zero. Most documents take 2-5 seconds end-to-end on a mid-range laptop.

Yes. No signup, no credit card, no 2-document-per-day cap (the Smallpdf free-tier limit), no 25 MB ceiling (the iLovePDF free-tier limit), no 50 MB / 200-page / 3-task-per-hour cap (the Sejda free-tier triple limit), no 7-day Acrobat Pro trial gate ($19.99/mo after). Split 200 contracts in a row if you need to. The whole tool runs in your browser, so we have no per-file server cost to ration.

Your PDF stays in your browser: iFillPDF splits entirely client-side using the PDF-lib WebAssembly engine. Your file never leaves your device — not to us, not to AWS, not to anyone. iLovePDF, Smallpdf, pdfFiller, Adobe Acrobat online and PDF24 all upload to their cloud, process server-side, then push the file back. Under GDPR Art. 4(2), processing implies the data is held by a controller — when the data never leaves your device, the legal risk surface disappears entirely.

No — and any page telling you otherwise is overselling. iFillPDF gives you two modes: one output file per page, or the custom ranges you type (1-5, 10, 15-20). There is no chapter detection, no outline-based splitting and no AI pass over the table of contents. In practice, opening the PDF, noting where each chapter starts and typing four ranges takes about thirty seconds and gives you exact control; if you genuinely need bookmark-driven splitting on a 250-page thesis, Adobe Acrobat Pro ($19.99/mo) splits on existing top-level bookmarks and is the better tool for that one job.

Partly, and it is worth knowing which parts. Page content, embedded fonts, images and AcroForm field widgets are copied across intact by pdf-lib, so a fillable page stays fillable. Two things do not survive: the document outline (bookmarks), which is not carried into the new files, and any digital signature, which by design covers the entire original document and is therefore invalidated the moment the file is split — no splitter can preserve it, whatever the marketing says. If you need a signed page as an exhibit, split first, then re-sign the extract.

There is no automatic split-by-file-size mode in iFillPDF — you split by page ranges and check the sizes. The practical route: run the file through our PDF compressor first (three presets, all in-browser), and if it is still over 25 MB, split it in halves or thirds by range and send two emails. Adobe Acrobat Pro does offer split-by-size, but only in its desktop app. Useful context for the target: Gmail caps attachments at 25 MB, Outlook.com / Microsoft 365 and iCloud Mail at 20 MB.

Three hard differences. (1) iFillPDF runs 100% client-side — Adobe, Smallpdf, iLovePDF, pdfFiller and PDF24 all upload your file to their cloud. (2) No daily cap: Smallpdf caps free users at 2 documents/day, Sejda at 3 tasks/hour, we cap at zero. (3) Frankfurt eu-central-1 under EU TADPF, outside the reach of the US Cloud Act — Adobe and Smallpdf process on US-East-1 AWS. For bookmark splitting, file-size splitting or bundled folder output, Acrobat Pro is the specialist workflow; iFillPDF is built for range-based, client-side splitting where the PDF stays in your browser.

It is GDPR-by-design, not just compliant. Because no personal data ever leaves your device (the splitter runs in your browser via WebAssembly), there is no data transfer to log under GDPR Art. 30, no processor agreement to sign under GDPR Art. 28, no Transfer Impact Assessment to file under GDPR Art. 46. Static assets and any optional account data sit in Frankfurt eu-central-1 (Hetzner Falkenstein, ISO 27001 + EU TADPF certified), outside the reach of the US Cloud Act and 50 USC §3024. Even EU-hosted competitors still process your file on their infrastructure; iFillPDF keeps the split in your browser tab.

100 MB — the drop zone rejects anything larger, and below that the practical ceiling is your browser memory since everything runs in the tab. Compare: Smallpdf caps free users at 5 MB, iLovePDF at 25 MB, Sejda at 50 MB, pdfFiller at 100 MB like us. Adobe Acrobat online accepts up to 1 GB but forces a sign-in and a 1,500-page hard cap. A 500-page legal contract well under 100 MB splits in a few seconds on an M1 MacBook Air.

Yes — once the iFillPDF page has loaded, you can disconnect from the internet and keep splitting PDFs. The WebAssembly engine runs entirely in your browser tab. Try that with iLovePDF, Smallpdf, pdfFiller, Adobe Acrobat online or PDF24 — all of them require a live connection to upload your file to their server.