InDesign - Export PDF file size

Hey everyone. I use InDesign to create my resume for job apps and whatnot. I've found that many corporate sites only accept file sizes under a certain limit (usually 500kb or smaller). My resume is usually around 590-610kb. Is there any way that I can reduce the file size without losing significant quality, or even any?
Cheers.

rayzha wrote:
So I need to d/l adobe acrobat?
OK, so this sounds like you don't have a Creative Suite package, or perhaps you are using Creative Cloud and didn't install Acrobat Pro.
The free Adobe Reader will not help you to optimize a PDF, you need the full, paid, Acrobat application. Uwe's suggestion to distill might get you a smaller PDF, but again, without Acrobat you won't have Distiller. There are a few freeware Distiller clones that would probably work for plain text, but I doubt there's much that can be done to bring the size down on a file that has nothing but text in it without removing the non-graphic disposables like metadata, and the embedded page thumbnails, which requires the optimizer.
It occurs to me that one reason your exported PDF might be large is that ID always embeds fonts unless they are restricted. If you are using common system fonts that you know your viewer will have, you can distill PDF without embedding fonts and save a couple of bytes. I just pulled up a random page from a student paper, which has about seven fonts in use. The usage audit says they total a bit over 2mb.

Similar Messages

Large PDF file sizes when exporting from InDesign

Hi,
I was wondering if anyone knew why some PDF file sizes are so large when exporting from ID.
I create black and white user manuals with ID CS3. We post these online, so I try to get the file size down as much as possible.
There is only one .psd image in each manual. The content does not have any photographs, just Illustrator .eps diagrams and line drawings. I am trying to figure out why some PDF file sizes are so large.
Also, why the file sizes are so different.
For example, I have one ID document that is 3MB.
Exporting it at the smallest file size, the PDF file comes out at 2MB.
Then I have another ID document that is 10MB.
Exporting to PDF is 2MB (the same size as the smaller ID document)... this one has many more .eps's in it and a lot more pages.
Then I have another one that the ID size is 8MB and the PDF is 6MBwhy is this one so much larger than the 10MB ID document?
Any ideas on why this is happening and/or how I can reduce the file size.
I've tried adjusting the export compression and other settings but that didn't work.
I also tried to reduce them after the fact in Acrobat to see what would happen, but it doesn't reduce it all that much.
Thanks for any help,
Cathy

> Though, the sizes of the .eps's are only about 100K to 200K in size and they are linked, not embedded.
But they're embedded in the PDF.
> It's just strange though because our marketing department as an 80 page full color catalog that, when exported it is only 5MB. Their ID document uses many very large .tif files. So, I am leaning toward it being an .eps/.ai issue??
Issue implies there's something wrong, but I think this is just the way
it's supposed to work.
Line drawings, while usually fairly compact, cannot be lossy compressed.
The marketing department, though, may compress their very large TIFF
files as much as they like (with a corresponding loss of quality). It's
entirely possible to compress bitmaps to a smaller size than the
drawings those bitmaps were made from. You could test this yourself.
Just open a few of your EPS drawings in Photoshop, save as TIFF, place
in ID, and try various downsampling schemes. If you downsample enough,
you'll get the size of the PDF below a PDF that uses the same graphics
as line drawing EPS files. But you may have to downsample them beyond
recognition...
Kenneth Benson
Pegasus Type, Inc.
www.pegtype.com

Question about reducing PDF file size on export

I have a large file that is generates a PDF about 75MB when exported with the "[High Quality Print]" preset. However, I can reduce the size down to to under 5MG in Acrobat if I use the Tools>Flattener Preview>[Medium Resolution] setting (image attached). Is there a way to generate this smaller file directly from InDesign? I couldn't figure out how to do this with InDesign's Flattener Preview or Export options, but it is very likely that I missed something.

Eugene Tyson wrote:
When you choose Smallest File size, it is still using the PDF 1.6 setting.
Change this to Acrobat 4 (PDF 1.3) this will automagically flatten the PDF - which means you shouldn't have to do it in Acrobat.
That should get you a nice small file size, I believe.
Flattening transparency in InDesign will not necessarily yield a smaller PDF file size. Transparency flattening will not automatically convert placed vector artwork to raster images unless that vector artwork is actually involved with transparency. And even then, whether you end up with a smaller file depends on a number of factors.
If the reason for the very large file size is indeed very complex vector artwork and you are willing to sacrifice quality, conversion of such vector artwork to raster might yield a significantly smaller exported PDF file. To accomplish that conversion, I would personally suggest converting the most offensive (in terms of file size and complexity) of such files in Illustrator (assuming that they were .AI files) and exporting them as .TIF files (to avoid the potential imaging artifacts of JPEG compression).
- Dov

InDesign Transparency Effect vs. pdf file size

I have an Interactive pdf that was created from InDesign. There is "inner glow" is an effect style created box style. This box style is used a number of times in the 30 page document. The glow is a gradient from black to transparent which looks like an inner shadow for the boxes (sample attached). When I generate the pdf file, size is about 12 Mgb, too large for the target audience.
When I alter the style in InDesign to say something simple like a 10% black solid fill, the pdf file size decreases to about 1 Mgb.
Looked into "flattening transparency" options but this creates pdf that has none of the interactive buttons and links that are required.
Really would like to avoid creating these boxes in photoshop since there are about 40 different sizes of the box.
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!

For some reason I can't find reply on Forums site, so replying to this
email
Exporting an Interactive pdf using the attached (15.8) jpegs settings
creates a file that is 15.8 Mgb.
Exporting an Interactive pdf using the attached (14.5) jpegs settings
creates a file that is 15.8 Mgb.
Any ideas??? Thanks.

Font Size is not correct in the exported PDF-File

In the Report is the Font Arial Size 8, but in the exported PDF-Fildethe size is only 7,15. The Fontsize in the PDF-File is always smaller then in the Report.
I use Crystal Report XI. With Version 9 is everythink ok.

In Crystal Reports 10 and 11, exported fonts are shrunk by 5% to avoid field truncation.
For version 11, create the following registry entry and then set the value to 1 to maintain the font size:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Business Objects\Suite 11.0\Crystal Reports\Export\PDF\ForceLargerFonts
Please back-up your registry before editing.
Cheers,
Fritz

I just updated my Indesign to CC14 and now I cannot export to anything - Failed to export PDF file

I just updated my Indesign to CC14 and now I cannot export to anything - Failed to export PDF file@

No error message it goes through the actions and then in the background task it shows error. I have tried to export to pdf, jpeg anything and nothing is product. I have tried highquality, low quality settings (all of them) and nothing.

PDF File Size - any way to compress further?

We have are using the Crystal for .NET export method to export a report to a .pdf file, and are having an issue with the pdf file size on a report that contains images. The images are stored in a SQL2005 database as blob or varbinary(max). The report executes a stored procedure that selects data (including images) to produce a quotation. There are input parms to decide which images to print (for example A, B or both A&B). Both types of images can appear at the line level on the quotation. Type A images print in the main report, Type B images are in a subreport. Both the main report & subreport execute a stored procedure to select an image type.
Our issue, when both Type A and B image is selected to print on a 293 line quote. The PDF file size is 44.23MB
When Type A only is selected, the PDF file size is 2.64MB
When Type B only is selected, the PFD file size is 43.95MB.
There are more Type B images that would print at the line level than Type A, but is there any way to compress this down further as it is too large to email.

You mention that you are using Crystal for .NET, but not what version; CR for .NET 2003, 2005, 2008. 2010?
Applying the latest fixes for the correct version of CR would be the first thing to do.
Next, I'd have a close look at image B as it appears to be the one adding the most "bulk". How is this image different from image A?
General tips re. images:
Save the files a BMPs.
When .jpg image is inserted into Crystal Reports it is converted into bitmap format and as the result of the conversion the report may loose some quality, scale and other issues may arise... E.g.; Crystal Reports is not so good a graphics management tool
When an image is saved as a .bmp, then there is no conversion required and thus the quality of the image should be preserved.
Best practice: save the image with high resolution and required size as a .bmp format then insert this image into Crystal Reports.
Resize the image to the smallest possible size and downgrade the DPI to 72. This will ensure your image is as small as possible and Crystal Reports will have to put in the least amount of work to display it.
Have a look ar KB [1241630 - Exporting a Crystal report (XI) to PDF generates a big PDF file|http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/servlet/prt/portal/prtroot/com.sap.km.cm.docs/oss_notes_boj/sdn_oss_boj_bi/sap(bD1lbiZjPTAwMQ==)/bc/bsp/spn/scn_bosap/notes%7B6163636573733d36393736354636443646363436353344333933393338323636393736354637333631373036453646373436353733354636453735364436323635373233443330333033303331333233343331333633333330%7D.do]. This KB, may apply to your version of CR, or not. In any case, you will have to use the KB as a guide and determine what the appropriate registry entry would be for your version of CR.
One more thing. Many people like to use jpg files as they are smaller than bmp files. However, as far as Crystal Reports is concerned, this is inconsequential. The report file will be the same size if a file is inserted as a jpg or a bmp. This is due to the jpg conversion to bmp Crystal Reports does internally.
Ludek
Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/SAPCRNetSup
Got Enhancement ideas? Try the [SAP Idea Place|https://ideas.sap.com/community/products_and_solutions/crystalreports]

A great tip for reducing PDF file sizes (e.g. from scanned images)

I just found, and used this tip and was so impressed I had to share it!
http://www.hoboes.com/Mimsy/hacks/quality-reduced-file-size/
By the way, you can also easily combine pdfs using preview. Open the 'main' one that will be your final file. Go to View -> Sidebar. Drag the other pdfs that you want to join right into the side bar. It will just stack them on. Then save.
C.
Message was edited by: Chipstix

Since a while DIAdem optimizes the size of exported PDF-files in a related way as it is suggested here. In principle the PDF-file is exported in a very high resolution, so you can display it in a reader with a very high zoom value (e. g. 6000 %) to look into details of your data. If you have a huge dataset, this could lead in fact to a bigger file size, if data points could be displayed because the high PDF-resolution. But in general, DIAdem only saves information in a PDF-file which is really necessary - but with a high resolution.

Exporting PDF files from SSRS 2012 - "There was an error opening this document. The file is damaged and could not be repaired"

Good day
I have the situation where we are exporting PDF files from reporting services in our website.
When dividing the data into sections, the report exports perfectly, but when exporting the entire set and trying to open the file, we get the following error in Adobe Reader:
"There was an error opening this document. The file is damaged and could not be repaired"
We tried to repair the file, no luck. We tried to use different PDF readers, no luck
We then checked the file sizes. When exporting the subsections, each section exports a file of about 2mb.
When exporting the entire set, the file is about 1.3mb.
Adding all the sections together gives me a rough estimate of 40mb.
Exporting to TIFF works beautifully and returns a file of 41.5mb. Word and Excel formats also work well, only issue there is the page numbering and formatting.
The problem we have is the clients are adamant about having it in PDF format.
Any advice please?

This was one of the temporary suggestions I gave the client...
Unfortunately they do not like this as the page numbering and formatting in Word does not appear right. We are talking about over 1300 pages. I can't expect them to change the formatting with each export. Additionally, the data is
constantly changing and each client has their own data. The clients export the reports randomly. I therefore can't post the reports back onto the server.
Thanks for the speedy response though

Trouble with Exported .pdf Files

I created three 20"x30" one-page documents (with iPhoto-sourced images) which saved as 24.7 MB, 19.4 MB, and 10.7 MB files, respectively. I needed to send JPEG files to my service provider for high-resolution prints. Since Pages '08 doesn't have a JPEG-export option, I exported each of them as .pdf files. My plan was to open the .pdf files in Photoshop and save them down as .jpg files. The same path had worked fine with a fourth Pages '08 layout of a 2.25"x3.75" document. With the three 20"x30" files, however, I ran into trouble.
My laptop didn't have enough memory to open the exported .pdf files in Photoshop Elements without suffering some image gray-out. I didn't think that was a problem until we discovered that my service provider couldn't open the files at all (running the current Photoshop on a souped-up system). Arghhh.
I switched to a service provider who can print straight from the .pdf files, but that also brought trouble. Though I could open the files easily in Acrobat 5.0, and they looked great, the service provider (running the current full version of Acrobat) could not open them; all he got was what looked like a blank page.
I don't think the trouble is related to file size, as the business-card document which sailed through without trouble saved as an 11.2 MB Pages file.
Could it be sheet size? That's the only thing I can figure. And why would the files open in Acrobat 5.0 without trouble, but not in the current Acrobat (or Acrobat Professional, which we also tried)?
I ended up "printing" the Pages files as "Save PDF to iPhoto," then exporting the iPhoto image as a maximum-resolution JPEG. The only trouble with that route was that the best I could get was a 200 dpi. When I went through Photoshop (instead of iPhoto) with the business card file, I ended up with a 300 dpi file.
Am I missing something obvious here? Any help would be appreciated.

Hi,
I don't know if this is the correct answer, but you can open a PDF in Preview and save the document as a JPEG and JPEG-2000. I know that Leopard will also have some neat functionality about this as well. You might also want to look at printing as a postscript file rather than a PDF and then open in Photoshop. I talked with a FEDEX/Kinkos employee yesterday about my book at he stated that Macs use 1.5 while Adobe's Acrobat is 1.7. Leopard should also fix this, but it may not help right now.
HTH

Printing issues from InDesign CS4 pdf file

Good morning,
Could you help explain and possibly resolve an issue I'm having with an InDesign CS4 pdf file where the text and image drop shadows (40%) are printing as solid black blocked shapes from a large format printer. The file encompasses 1 overall image, 1 image with drop shadow, 3 text frames with drop shadow effect applied to the text and 1 group set of simple rectangular and ellipse objects with a glow.
My colleagues in graduate school experienced the same with their files and the output bureau's rasterized the pdf file in Photoshop where it printed out with good resolution. Shouldn't this be resolved first in InDesign rather than rasterizing the file?
I appreciate any help and insight you could offer myself and my colleagues.
Thank you, Kathryn

The printing service uses Acrobat 8 Pro and HP large format printer. My InDesign CS4 document is in the color mode of RGB and color type as Process. I saved it as a pdf file using the standard settings as follows: Preset: High Quality Print, Standard: None and Compatibility: Acrobat 4 (PDF 1.3). Are there options I should be paying more attention to when creating the PDF file? Also, I was reading up on Peter Spier's response links.
This brings me to the next question...I'm creating a photo book for grad school with approximately 40 pages of images (RGB, 300dpi) with feathered drop shadows. What would be the best settings to use when exporting as a pdf file for printing services?
Thank you for your help.
Kathryn

PDF file size too large

Hi,
I have a report (6i and 9Ids) which contains an image (stored as a blob in the database (8i)). The size of the image in the database (and as a file) is just 750k. The image is sized to fit on to the A4 report page. If I set the desformat of this report to PDF the resulting PDF output file is 10mb in size. I need to make this report available over the web so this is too large. Has anyone got any ideas as to reducing the output file size?
I have tried the pdfcomp report parameter with no joy.
Cheers
Andy

Hi Andy,
The image you are using might be a JPEG image. In 6i and 9i, while generating the PDF file, Oracle Reports always converts the image to GIF and embed it. This image type conversion increases the file size of the outputimage and hence PDF file size increases. This is fixed in Oracle Reports 10g.
In Oracle Reports 10g, you can select the outputimageformat based on your need, using either:
1. commandline: OUTPUTIMAGEFORMAT
(or)
2. environment variable: REPORTS_OUTPUTIMAGEFORMAT
If your image in the database is a JPEG image, set the outputimageformat to JPEG. Hence, there will not be any image type conversion and the PDF file will be very small.
Please refer to the Publishing Reports manual to know more about the usage of these commandline/environment variable.
Links:
http://download-west.oracle.com/docs/cd/B10464_01/bi.904/b10314/pbr_cla.htm#644163
http://download-west.oracle.com/docs/cd/B10464_01/bi.904/b10314/pbr_rfap.htm#644448
Thanks,
Regards,
Siva B

Reduce PDF File Size - any ideas?

Hi all,
I have a C++/C# programs that generates PDF's in Adobe Reader using Infragistics. This is a recent change from using VS View as our old method of illustrating - we now use Infragistics. This has resulted in our PDF File sizes almost doubling due to us now using Bookmarks within the PDFs and also having to embed the fonts. There are some pictures used but these are already very small so they are not the issue. I was wondering does anyone have any ideas of how we could possibly reduce the size again or any possible work arounds.
Any help would be great.
Colly (Ireland)

Where do these EPS files come from Photoshop or Illustrator?
Illustrator
There may be nothing wrong with EPS files technically, they are considered archaic in a modern workflow. Best to save as a .ai with pdf compatible file - or to save them as PDF x4a with Illustrator Editing Capabilities enabled.
But I don't think there's any need to run out and convert all your files - perhaps keep it in mind going forward.
Photoshop
EPS is really not the best format. If it's pure raster then PSD or TIFF would be preferred format, if it's Raster + Vector Shapes, Vector Masks, Text Layers then PDF is preferred over EPS (with photoshop editing capabilities enabled).
File sizes react differently depending on the content on the choice of compression. Heavy Vector files from Illustrator can cause Huge file sizes in PDFs.
See this article (and more importantly the comments!)
http://indesignsecrets.com/creating-smaller-pdfs-from-a-vector-dense-book.php
If you can provide a bit more info on your workflow and what settings you are using to save it would be great.

Using Examine Document Remove increases pdf file size !

Hi,
I have Adobe Acrobat Pro v9.3.0
I've been editing a lot of scanned .pdfs - rotating and cropping pages.
All this has previously worked fine with v8 but now I find that Acrobat 9 is increasing the .pdf file size after using Examine Document and clicking Remove
For example:
original file: 16,861 Kbytes
file after cropping 74 pages (from A4 to A5): 16,879 Kbytes
file after running Examine Document > Remove cropped metadata : 79,914 Kbytes !!!
With Acrobat 8 this process would normally have halved the file size.
Am I now doing something wrong ??
Thanks in advance.

Hello - This problem is still here !
Acrobat 9 Pro version 9.4.2
I've got a .pdf created by an agency (so not a scanned image) which I want to make as small as possible for emailing to hundreds of people (I'll attach it if possible somehow ?)
I open it up when it's 331Kb
Click Document > Examine Document
Check the Metadata and Deleted/Cropped items
Click Remove
Click File > Save As and hey presto, the new file with all that stuff supposedly removed is 2,588 Kb
Surely I'm not the only one who's bothered about .pdf file size ?

PDF file size

I have an HP Officejet 6500 E710n-z (Network) that I use at home to scan into PDFs, and I know exactly how to move the slider from "Smallest size" to "Best quality"
However the size of the PDFs are unacceptably large when image quality is acceptable, and if I move the slider to reduce the size then the image becomes unacceptable. It is impossible to scan a legal document of more than a few legible pages without producing a file size too large to email . I am forced to break these scanned documents into 3-4 page bite-sized chunks.
A simple one page HOA Disclosure form, at 220 DPI and the slider in the middle for balance, produces a 699K PDF. I have used other printer scanners at work (different brands) at the same 200 DPI that results in very clear documents at less than 100K per page.
I believe there is something wrong with HP's scan-to-PDF algorithm. The problem must be due to some unskilled (or flawed) software design. What will it take to have HP or third party developer (and developer staff supervision) take this seriously -- compare HP vs other brand scanners PDF files -- and update the HP drivers to fix this?
This question was solved.
View Solution.

Just a follow up. I went into chat mode with some low-level tech named Nathan, giving him the link to this thread. After reading it, he suggested I can improve file size by using greyscale and 200 DPI. DUH!!!! I complained he was just humoring me, so he said I should call the tech support number.
I did that next and spoke with a very nice young lady who actually DID take me seriously. I could hear her typing away vigorously in the background, capturing every detail of my plea for this to be forwarded up the chain of command for serious consideration. It was clear she understood and captured from me that there are many forum complaints that can be found with a search term "PDF File Size" that are getting weak or unacceptable "solutions" to push the slider left or use lower DPI etc. She also captured my assurances that some competitor brands produce PDF file sizes 20 times smaller for the same image quality.
I believe that this might actually be opened up at a higher level for consideration of an improvement in the compression algorithm. My fingers are crossed. Since I have about 11 months left for warranty support, I plan to contact them once or twice again before it expires, using the same case number to see if there is any progress.
Bottom line: At my default of 200 DPI and 20% image quality, with an average file size for a single sample page producing a file size of 281KB, a 25-page document creates a PDF file that is 7MB! That will just barely make it past the file size limit for my email provider, but might be too large for the recipient. That is still unacceptable, and is forcing me to consider products other than HP for this business purpose.

InDesign - Export PDF file size

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