How to Merge PDF Offline

PDF merger is an invaluable tool for reports, presentations, and e-books. Depending on your OS, you can combine documents with or without third-party tools. Here are the most reliable methods for users of Windows and Mac. Forget online merger sites — you can join files together on your machine without uploading them anywhere.

Online services are far from perfect. First, they only work for modest volumes of data. Secondly, users cannot customize the result aside from reordering the pages. Finally, the method is not appropriate for confidential and sensitive documents. Knowing how to merge PDF files offline, you can achieve the result quickly and safely. Discover the best systems for Mac and Windows below.

Merge PDF on Mac

Mac users can use an in-built tool — Preview. If you do not know where to find the shortcut to the program, use a new Finder window to search for it. The system is quite straightforward. Here is what to do to combine two or more PDFs.

• Open the program.
• Open any of the files you want to be merged.
• Click on the “View” option for the document.
• Select “Thumbnail” to make document thumbnails visible in the sidebar.
• Drag the other file into the sidebar of Preview to merge the documents.
• Add the rest of the files in the same fashion.
• Rearrange the thumbnails as you see fit.

Note: The program saves all the changes automatically. If you want to keep the original files, too, do not forget to create their duplicates beforehand. This is easy to do — just open the ‘File’ menu for the PDF file, and choose the corresponding option.

Merge PDF on Windows

Windows users do not have any native tools at their disposal. They need to choose reliable third-party tools designed especially for mergers. The process depends on the program, but the most efficient systems get the job done in a couple of steps, without limitations.

Aside from merging the pages, you can customize them in a variety of ways. Make the document easier to navigate, protect the contents from prying eyes, add headers or footers… the list is long. Here are some of the most popular options:

• add a cover page;
• insert page counters;
• stamp bates to prepare the document for e-discovery;
• add a digital signature;
• generate bookmarks or load them from a separate file;
• add a clickable table of contents;
• insert a watermark to safeguard intellectual property;
• add blank pages for double-sided printing;
• set a password or user permissions.

A good versatile tool can also merge files by folders and automatically detect files with a similar name. As you can see, it takes file merger to a whole new level! The trial version gives you 30 days of free unlimited use, so you can check how the system works in practice.