How to Copy and Paste from PDF to Word without Losing Formatting in 2024

PDF is usually considered to be the most reliable file format since it can't be changed easily. However, this also means it is not as convenient as a Word file which can be modified at any time. Therefore, sometimes you need to convert a PDF file into an editable Word file or copy PDF file content and paste it into a Word document.

In most cases, you can copy and paste the content of a PDF file easily. However, you can't do it if the PDF is an image or is protected with a password. Not to say that to keep it neat and tidy, you need to copy and paste the PDF file without losing formatting. In this article, we will show you how to do so with detailed tutorials and proper tools.

Part 1. Copy and Paste from PDF to Word with Adobe Acrobat

Adobe Acrobat is one of the most popular software used to edit PDF files. With this tool, you can freely read, create, edit and apply many other functions to PDF documents. You can even convert your PDF files into many other file formats like doc./docx. with its conversion feature.

The conversion is quite simple, in this article, we will mainly show you how to use its copy-and-paste function to move PDF content to a Word file. If you want to copy PDF to Word without losing formatting, just follow the step-by-step guide provided below.

Copy and Paste all the text on a page

Step 1. Choose "View" > "Page Display" > "Single Page View".

Step 2. Choose "Edit" > "Select All", or you can click four times in the text, which selects all the text on the page regardless of the page layout.

Step 3. Open a Word file and paste the PDF content you copied to it.

Copy and Paste the Selected Text

Step 1. Use your mouse to select any amount of text on the page.

Step 2. Choose "Edit" > "Copy" to copy the text selected, or you can right-click on the selected text and then select "Copy" or "Copy With Formatting". Since you want to keep the formatting, we suggest you choose the latter.

Step 3. Now, you can open a Word file and paste the PDF content you copied to it.

Part 2. Copy and Paste from PDF to Word without Losing Formatting

To move the content of a PDF file to a Word document, you can use EaseUS PDF Editor. This program supports almost all the popular file formats, and you are able to migrate PDF text to Word with it easily. And if you want, the original format will be kept the same.

This tool can help you achieve your goal in two ways. You can open a PDF with it and use the editing function to copay and paste the content to a Word with original formatting, or you can convert the PDF file to a Word document with its converting function. Below are the main features of it, let's have a look.

• Copy and paste PDF content without losing text formatting
• Convert PDF file format to other document formats like docx. easily
• The OCR features even makes a scanned PDF editable
• Edit text font, size, color, spacing, placement, etc.
• Create forms, fill forms, securely share them with others

Now, download EaseUS PDF Editor and follow the steps below to copy and paste PDF content.

Step 1. First, launch EaseUS PDF Editor and click on Open to import the PDF document you want to edit.

Step 2. Once opened, choose the Edit option on the top toolbar. To edit the text in your PDF, just select the text in your file, and you can adjust the font, font color, position, character spacing, line spacing, and more. If needed, you can underline, strikethrough, and bold the text.

Step 3. Besides, you are able to copy, paste, and delete the text you selected by right-clicking your mouse when you have chosen the text.

Step 3. To export your edited PDF, just click File > Save.

Part 3. Copy and Paste from PDF to Word with Google Drive

To get the content of a PDF file that is encoded, you can run Google Drive to convert it to selectable text as Google Drive offers a free OCR service. Also, Google Drive allows its users to copy and paste from a protected PDF to a Word document. Therefore, copying and pasting from a PDF file to Word with original formatting is quite simple. All you need to do is follow the steps below.

Step 1. Search and open the Google Drive site on your web browser. Sign in to your Google account with your account.

Step 2. Click on the "NEW" option in the top left corner to turn it on. Select "File upload" from its drop-down menu.

Step 3. Choose the PDF file you want to import on your computer and click "Open" to confirm.

Step 4. Click the three-dots "Menu" option on the top menu bar and select "Open". Then click "Google Docs" to let it scan your imported PDF file.

Step 5. Choose "Edit" on the menu bar under your PDF file name and click "Select All" to highlight all the text. Then right-click your mouse and choose "Copy" (or you can use hotkey Ctrl+C).

Step 6. Open a Microsoft Word document, right-click your mouse and choose the "Paste" button to paste the PDF content you just copied (or you can use hotkey Ctrl+V).

Part 4. Copy and Paste PDF with ABBYY FineReader

ABBYY FineReader is considered by some as one of the best alternatives to Adobe Acrobat. It is capable of opening, editing, and converting PDF files, including native, scanned, printed, or protected ones. Also, it integrates features like editing, protecting, signing, creating, and converting PDFs, etc. To convert your PDF file into a Word doc., follow the guide below.

Step 1. Download and install ABBYY FineReader to your computer, then run it.

Step 2. Click "Open" in the menu and import the PDF file you want to convert.

Step 3. If you get the content by scanning, you need to choose "Recognize for OCR" first.

Step 4. Choose Word document as output, then your PDF will be saved as a Word document.

Conclusion

In this article, we give you four tools to copy and paste the content of a PDF file into a Word document. All of them can help you achieve your goal, you need to choose the one that suits you the best. For Windows PC users, we sincerely recommend you to download EaseUS PDF Editor since it can copy and paste from PDF to Word without losing formatting.