Rearrange the pages of a PDF

Moving pages, one drag at a time

Each drag moves one page. Drop it on the top half of another thumbnail and it lands before that page; on the bottom half, after it. To send a page to the very end, drop it on the bottom half of the last thumbnail. The page numbers in the bar update as you go, so the new order is always in front of you.

In a long document, move a block by dragging its pages one after another. If a whole section is far out of place, it can be quicker to save that section as its own PDF, delete it here, click the page it should follow, and drop the saved file back in.

Ctrl Z undoes a move, up to 100 steps back, and the file on disk is untouched until you save.

Organizing pages from several files

Reordering is often the second half of a merge. Open a cover letter, an application form and three scanned certificates together, and all their pages share one page bar, ready to be put in order. Pictures join in as pages too, so a photo of a document can be dragged like any other page.

New pages always go right after the page you are on. Click a thumbnail first, then use Add pages from other files… in the PDF menu, the + at the top of the page bar, or drop files onto the open document. Add a blank page inserts an A4 page in the same place: a divider before a new section, or a page to type notes on. Blank pages count when you add page numbers later, so remove spare ones before numbering.

What a new order means for the file

When the pages are no longer in their original order, Octoolo saves a new PDF made of copies of them, in the order you set. Each page looks exactly as before, with searchable text and full-quality pictures.

Some things belonged to the old order and do not come along: bookmarks, which pointed at pages in their old places, and the fields of a fillable form. If you need those, leave the order alone and only turn pages, which keeps them.

Numbers already printed on the pages are part of them and move with them. To number the pages in their new order, switch on page numbers in the Document panel after rearranging; see add page numbers. A table of contents printed in the document will not update itself, so check it against the new order.

Orders that often need fixing

• Fronts and backs scanned separately. A scanner without two-sided scanning gives all the fronts, then all the backs. Octoolo has no automatic interleave, so drag each back page after its front: ten sheets mean ten drags.
• A stack fed in back to front, which comes out reversed from the last page to the first.
• An appendix or a cover in the wrong place, usually after a merge where the files were picked in the wrong order.
• A signature page returned on its own that has to go back in its place in the contract.
• Slides or handouts saved as PDF where one section should come earlier for a different audience.

Pages that also lie on their side can be turned in the same pass, and duplicates deleted, before a single save writes the tidy document.