pdfmt is a command-line toolkit for the PDF tasks you keep doing again and again.
Merge PDFs. Split them. Extract pages. Reorder documents. Scan from your scanner and OCR them. Add stamps. And when a task becomes repetitive, turn it into a reusable workflow.
No GUI required. No cloud upload required. Just your PDFs, your terminal, and the tools you already use.
MT stands for Multi-Tool. pdfmt brings many small PDF operations together behind one consistent command-line interface.
A project from eifelcode.com.
Working with PDFs often means reaching for a different tool for every little task:
- "I only need pages 2, 4 and 6."
- "I need to split this 100-page PDF."
- "I scanned the front and back separately. Now I need to put them back together."
- "I need to merge these five documents."
- "I need to add a processed stamp."
- "I need to OCR my documents."
- "I have to do this every week."
pdfmt is designed for exactly these situations.
Instead of remembering a collection of different commands, options, pipes and tools, you can use one interface:
pdfmt <command> <subcommand> [arguments]And because pdfmt is a command-line tool, it works just as well interactively as it does in scripts and automated workflows.
Once pdfmt is installed, you can immediately start working with your PDFs.
pdfmt merge all cover.pdf report.pdf appendix.pdf complete.pdfpdfmt split all document.pdf page_This creates:
page_1.pdf
page_2.pdf
page_3.pdf
...
pdfmt extract range document.pdf 1-3,7,10-12 extracted.pdfpdfmt remove range document.pdf 5,8-10 cleaned.pdfpdfmt sort reverse document.pdf reversed.pdfpdfmt stamp text invoice.pdf "Paid on 2026-08-28" invoice-paid.pdfAnd when you need something more complex, combine these commands into a workflow.
pdfmt is particularly useful when several simple PDF operations need to be combined.
You have a stack of invoices or delivery notes. Your scanner can scan the entire stack, but each document should become its own PDF.
pdfmt scan adf invoices.pdf
pdfmt split all invoices.pdf invoice_You now have:
invoice_1.pdf
invoice_2.pdf
invoice_3.pdf
...
No need to scan every document individually.
Your scanner has an ADF, but it cannot scan both sides automatically.
Scan the front sides:
pdfmt scan adf front.pdfTurn the stack over and scan the back sides:
pdfmt scan adf back.pdfThen reconstruct the correct page order:
pdfmt merge duplex front.pdf back.pdf documents.pdfIf every physical document consists of two pages, split the result into individual documents:
pdfmt split length documents.pdf 2 document_You end up with:
document_1.pdf
document_2.pdf
document_3.pdf
...
Sometimes a scanned PDF contains several documents with different lengths.
For example, if the first document consists of pages 1–4 and 6, the second of pages 7–10, and the third of pages 11–12:
pdfmt split range documents.pdf 1-4,6 7-10 11-12 document_The result is:
document_1.pdf
document_2.pdf
document_3.pdf
Each output can contain a completely different page range.
You can also include the same page in several output documents:
pdfmt split range document.pdf 1-7 1,8-10 1,11-14 split_doc_Here, page 1 becomes part of every resulting PDF.
If you have scanned documents, you can simply add an OCR text layer and then search for text within those PDFs:
# add the OCR text layer
pdfmt ocr add file-without-ocr.pdf file-with-ocr.pdf
# show the OCR text layer (to use with grep)
pdfmt ocr show file-with-ocr.pdfYou received an invoice as a PDF and want to mark it as processed:
pdfmt stamp text invoice.pdf "Paid on 2026-08-28" invoice-paid.pdfThe result is a new PDF with the stamp applied.
Sometimes one command isn't enough.
A workflow lets you turn several pdfmt commands into one reusable command.
For example, scanning both sides of a document with a scanner that does not support hardware duplex scanning normally requires several steps:
- Scan the front.
- Turn the paper stack around.
- Scan the back.
- Put the pages back into the correct order.
- Clean up temporary files.
With a workflow, all of that can become:
pdfmt workflow run scan-duplex adf output.pdfA workflow is simply an executable shell script like this one, a simplified version of scan-duplex from the official pdfmt-workflows repository (see also pre-defined workflows below):
#!/usr/bin/env bash
# Scan both sides of a document and merge them into a single PDF.
pdfmt scan "$1" front.pdf
read -r -p "Turn the paper stack and press ENTER to continue..."
pdfmt scan "$1" back.pdf
pdfmt merge duplex front.pdf back.pdf "$2"
rm front.pdf back.pdfThis is intentionally simple. Workflows are just shell scripts, so you can combine pdfmt with other command-line tools as well.
pdfmt workflow listpdfmt workflow info scan-duplexPlace an executable script in one of your configured workflow directories:
~/.local/share/pdfmt/workflows/
└── my-workflow
The third line is used as the workflow description:
#!/usr/bin/env bash
# =============================...
# My custom PDF workflow.
#
# ...Then run it like any other pdfmt command:
pdfmt workflow run my-workflow ...This makes workflows useful for anything you find yourself doing repeatedly.
If you don't want to write workflows from scratch, check out the official pdfmt-workflows repository for ready-to-use community scripts.
To install a pre-defined workflow, download the script into your local workflows directory and make it executable:
WORKFLOW_NAME=scan-duplex #< Name of the workflow to install
# Download and install workflow
curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/eifelcode/pdfmt-workflows/main/workflows/$WORKFLOW_NAME -o ~/.local/share/pdfmt/workflows/$WORKFLOW_NAME
chmod +x ~/.local/share/pdfmt/workflows/$WORKFLOW_NAMEpdfmt currently provides commands for:
| Task | Examples |
|---|---|
| Extract pages | Extract even pages, odd pages, or arbitrary ranges |
| Merge PDFs | Merge documents, interleave duplex scans, insert documents |
| OCR PDFs | Execute OCR operations on PDF files |
| Remove pages | Remove even pages, odd pages, or arbitrary ranges |
| Scan documents | Scan using an ADF or flatbed scanner |
| Sort pages | Reverse, shuffle, swap, move and handle duplex page orders |
| Split PDFs | Split into individual pages, fixed-size chunks, or custom ranges |
| Stamp PDFs | Add custom text stamps |
| Automate tasks | Create reusable shell-based workflows |
For detailed command usage, run:
pdfmt <command> helpFor example:
pdfmt split help
pdfmt merge help
pdfmt scan help
pdfmt workflow helpBelow is a quick overview of all available commands. To get detailed usage instructions for a specific command, simply run pdfmt <command> help.
| Category | Command | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Extract | extract even |
Extract all even-numbered pages |
extract help |
Help of category Extract | |
extract odd |
Extract all odd-numbered pages | |
extract range |
Extract a specific range of pages (e.g., 1-5) into a new PDF | |
| Merge | merge all |
Combine PDFs into a single document |
merge duplex |
Interleave two PDFs (front/back scans) into one duplex document | |
merge help |
Help of category Merge | |
merge insert |
Insert a PDF into another document at a specific page | |
| OCR | ocr add |
Add an OCR text layer to a PDF document |
ocr exists |
Check if a PDF document contains an OCR/text layer | |
ocr help |
Help of category Ocr | |
ocr show |
Display the extracted OCR text layer of a PDF document | |
| Remove | remove even |
Remove all even-numbered pages |
remove help |
Help of category Remove | |
remove odd |
Remove all odd-numbered pages | |
remove range |
Remove a specific range of pages (e.g., 1-5) | |
| Scan | scan adf |
Scan documents from ADF (automatic document feeder) into a new PDF |
scan flatbed |
Scan documents from flatbed scanner into a new PDF | |
scan help |
Help of category Scan | |
| Sort | sort duplex |
Reorder a single PDF containing consecutive front and back scans |
sort help |
Help of category Sort | |
sort move |
Move specific pages to a new position within the PDF | |
sort random |
Shuffle the pages of a PDF into a random order | |
sort reverse |
Reverse the page order of a PDF | |
sort swap |
Swap two specific pages within a PDF | |
| Split | split all |
Split a PDF into separate files, one for each page |
split help |
Help of category Split | |
split length |
Split a PDF into chunks of a fixed number of pages | |
split range |
Split a PDF into multiple files based on page ranges | |
| Stamp | stamp help |
Help of category Stamp |
stamp text |
Add a custom text stamp to a PDF | |
| Workflow | workflow help |
Help of category Workflow |
workflow info |
Shows information about a workflow | |
workflow list |
Lists all available workflow scripts | |
workflow run |
Runs a workflow script | |
| Misc | help |
Help of pdfmt |
version |
Displays the version of pdfmt |
pdfmt requires Bash 4.3 or newer.
The required runtime tools are:
| Program | Linux | macOS | Used for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bash >= 4.3 | bash |
bash |
Running pdfmt |
| pdftk | pdftk |
pdftk-java |
PDF manipulation |
| ImageMagick | imagemagick |
imagemagick |
Image/PDF operations |
| SANE | sane-utils |
sane-backends |
Scanning |
| OCRmyPDF | ocrmypdf |
ocrmypdf |
OCR operations |
Not every command requires every dependency. For example, SANE is only needed for the scan command and OCRmyPDF is only needed for ocr add.
On Debian/Ubuntu:
sudo apt install bash pdftk imagemagick sane-utilsOther Linux distributions may use different package names.
Using Homebrew:
brew install bash pdftk-java imagemagick sane-backendsmacOS ships with Bash 3.2, which is too old for pdfmt. Make sure a newer Bash version is available.
Download the latest release binary directly via terminal:
# Download the latest binary
curl -sSL https://github.com/eifelcode/pdfmt/releases/latest/download/pdfmt -o pdfmt
# Make it executable
chmod +x pdfmt
# Move it to your PATH (e.g., /usr/local/bin or ~/.local/bin)
sudo mv pdfmt /usr/local/bin/Alternatively, visit the Releases Page to manually download the pdfmt file for a specific version.
Clone the repository and use the included Makefile to build and install pdfmt into /usr/local/bin:
make
make installpdfmt creates configuration files when they are needed. This means you can start using commands without having to configure everything beforehand.
Configuration files are stored below:
~/.config/pdfmt/
The scan command uses:
~/.config/pdfmt/scan.conf
The configuration includes:
| Setting | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
scan.device |
- | Scanner device |
scan.source.adf |
ADF |
ADF source |
scan.source.flatbed |
Flatbed |
Flatbed source |
scan.resolution |
300 |
Resolution in DPI |
scan.mode |
Color |
Scan mode |
scan.paper.format |
A4 |
Paper format |
The scanner device can be identified with:
scanimage -f "%d" | head -n 1The stamp text command uses:
~/.config/pdfmt/stamp_text.conf
Available settings include:
| Setting | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
stamp.text.font.file |
- | Font file |
stamp.text.font.size |
22 |
Font size |
stamp.text.font.color |
#DC143C |
Stamp color |
The workflow command uses:
~/.config/pdfmt/workflow.conf
Available settings include:
| Setting | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
workflow.paths |
~/.local/share/pdfmt/workflows |
List of directories separated by : where your workflow scripts are located |
The ocr command uses:
~/.config/pdfmt/ocr.conf
Available settings include:
| Setting | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
ocr.language |
eng |
Language codes used for OCR text recognition. |
ocr.plugin |
|
The OCRmyPDF engine plugin to be used. If empty Tesseract will be used. |
Note: If a configured plugin like ocrmypdf_rapidocr is not installed on the system, pdfmt ocr add will exit with a clear error message rather than creating faulty PDFs.
pdfmt uses OCRmyPDF for text recognition, which also supports plugins. For optimal performance and accuracy (especially on CPUs and Intel Macs), the RapidOCR plugin is recommended. If you need maximum recognition quality on complex layouts and have a powerful GPU and RAM available, take a look at EasyOCR.
After installing your preferred plugin, you can enable it by updating the configuration file:
# Enable RapidOCR:
ocr.plugin=ocrmypdf_rapidocrNote: If you get errors like ValueError: Unsupported rec.lang_type='latin' for PP-OCRv6 small model. ensure the correct model for RapidOCR is installed.
pdfmt is designed around a simple idea:
Small PDF operations should be easy to combine.
Use one command when one command is enough.
Use several commands when you need to process a document.
And when you find yourself typing the same sequence again and again, turn it into a workflow.
Because pdfmt is a command-line tool, it can also be used from shell scripts, cron jobs, automation and other command-line workflows.
pdfmt is an open-source project built with Bash.
The project is organized into small, isolated commands under sources/command/.
Tests use bashunit and shell scripts are checked with ShellCheck.
The required runtime tools for development are:
| Program | Linux | macOS | Used for |
|---|---|---|---|
| make | make |
make |
Build and test automation |
| shellcheck | shellcheck |
shellcheck |
Shell script linting |
| bashunit | bashunit |
bashunit |
Unit and integration tests |
| Poppler | poppler-utils |
poppler |
Verifying PDF test results |
Run the complete test suite with:
make testTo contribute to pdfmt, see:
Bug reports, feature requests and contributions are welcome.
pdfmt is licensed under the MIT License. See LICENSE for details.