Add Page Numbers to PDF
Add page numbers to a PDF and see them land before you commit: five formats, nine positions, any start number, and a cover you can leave bare. The preview restamps as you tweak.
The page
Drop a PDF and the numbered page shows here, exactly as it will be saved.
Document
Drop a PDF here
The numbers land on the real page as you set them — nothing uploads
How to use
- Drop the PDF on the file box, or press Choose file and browse. The first page appears in the well already carrying a plain 1 at its foot, and a rail of thumbnails beside the controls takes you to any other page.
- Pick what it says from the five cards. Both 1 of 24 and 1 / 24 print a running total; the roman card prints i, ii, iii in lowercase, which is what a preface usually wants.
- Press a cell in the Where it sits grid. Anything in the top row sits 28 points down from the top edge by default, which is often precisely where a header already lives.
- Start numbering from page decides which page numbering begins on, and the rail marks the pages before it bare. Start at decides what that first numbered page displays. A chapter continuing an earlier file numbers from page 1 but starts at 47.
- Margin, Face, Emphasis, Size and Color handle fit and finish. The figure under the controls changes as you type; the page catches up a moment later, and Download stays held until it has.
- Press Download numbered PDF. The stamped file is already built by then, so the button only saves it, named after your original with -numbered on the end.
How the numbering works
Adding page numbers to a PDF here means drawing a fresh layer of vector text over each page, which is why everything already on the page comes through untouched and still selectable. Five formats sit as cards that print their own sample against your file: a bare 1, Page 1, 1 of 24, 1 / 24, and lowercase roman numerals for front matter. Where it sits is a three by three grid laid out like the page, with bottom centre pressed because that is where most documents put them. The margin is the gap from the page edge in points: Snug is 18, Standard 28, Wide 40, and typing your own figure lets the preset go.
How it looks covers the rest. Sixteen font families sit in the Face list, from the document staples (Arial, Times, Courier, Calibri, Cambria, Georgia) out through Montserrat and Playfair Display to, if the job genuinely calls for it, Pacifico, with bold, italic, underline and strikethrough as four toggles beside it. Colour takes a hex value or the swatch, and where your browser supports it a pipette lifts a shade off the screen. Every change restamps the real file about a third of a second later and redraws the page you are looking at; the rail of thumbnails jumps to any other, and Download waits until the copy matches what you set.
Numbering a report that has a cover
Take a 12-page report whose first page is the title. Load it, pick the With the total card, leave Where it sits on bottom centre, put 2 in Start numbering from page and leave Start at on 1. The rail marks the title page bare. Page 2 prints 1 of 11 and the final page prints 11 of 11.
That N is the highest number the run produces, not a count of the pages in the file. Skipping the cover took one page out of the sequence, so eleven is correct. Feed it report.pdf and the button hands back report-numbered.pdf.
Good to know
- It stacks, it never erases. Numbers already printed into the file, or baked into a scanned page image, stay exactly where they are. The tool reads every page, looks in the top and bottom 15% of each for a rising integer, and when most pages carry one it names them and says which corner they sit in.
- One format, one position, one size for the entire file. A document that wants roman numerals through the front matter and arabic afterwards has to be cut in two with Split & Organize PDF, numbered separately, then put back together with Merge PDF.
- There is no prefix field and no zero padding, which puts a proper legal Bates stamp like ABC-000123 out of reach. A fixed start number in a fixed corner covers the plain sequential half of the job.
- Each change rebuilds the whole numbered document rather than only the page in view, so a long file pauses for a moment after each nudge of the size box before the page and the Download button catch up.
- A PDF that opens only with a password is refused as soon as it is dropped, with a button to Unlock PDF. Take the password off there and bring the result back here.
Frequently asked questions
How do I add page numbers starting from page 2?
Put 2 in Start numbering from page. The cover is then skipped, its thumbnail in the rail is marked bare, and page 2 becomes the first stamped page. Leave Start at on 1 if you want that page to read 1, or set it to 2 if you would rather the printed number match the physical page.
What does the N in 1 of N actually count?
The highest number the run reaches, which is not always the page count. Number a 12-page file from page 3 with Start at 1 and you get ten stamped pages reading 1 of 10 through 10 of 10. Set Start at to 5 instead and the same pages read 5 of 14.
Can I have roman numerals on the preface and normal numbers after it?
Not in a single pass. The format applies to the whole file. Split the document at the end of the front matter, run the first part with the roman format and the second part with Start at set to 1, then merge the two halves back together.
Will this work on a scan that has no text in it?
Yes, and it is one of the better reasons to use it. The number is drawn as real vector text on top of the page image, so it stays crisp at any zoom even though the page underneath is a photograph. What it cannot do is remove a number that was already on the paper when it was scanned.
It says some pages already carry numbers. How does it know?
It reads the text of every page and looks in the top and bottom 15% of each one for a number of four digits or fewer. If most pages have one and the values climb, that is a running sequence: the warning names those pages, says which corner they sit in, and offers the opposite corner. It is a heuristic, so a page carrying a footnote marker or a date can set it off.
Can I use this for Bates numbering on a discovery set?
Only the simple end of it. Set a start number, choose a bottom corner and the file gets a continuous sequence, which is fine for internal exhibit numbering. Formal Bates stamps usually want a case prefix and leading zeros, and neither exists here.
Can I change the font of the numbers?
Sixteen families are in the Face list, with bold, italic, underline and strikethrough toggles next to it. Arial is the default. Matching the document's own body font, most often Times or Calibri, is what makes a stamped number look like it belongs.
How long a PDF can I number in one go?
There is no page cap written into the tool. What actually decides it is memory: the original bytes, the stamped copy and the rendered page all sit in the tab at once, so a phone will tap out well before a laptop does. Numbering is one pass over the file either way, so a 500-page report is one press of the button.
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