PDF to TIFF converter

PDF → TIFF renders every page into a single multi-page TIFF with the resolution tag set, the container fax, archiving and OCR tools expect.

Converted with Image engine · input deleted within 24 h
Free: 5 conversions a day · 5 MB each
Higher limits →

From real runs

What you get — and what changes

Element	Result	What happens
Pages	Kept	A two-page deck rendered into one TIFF with two frames; page order and count matched the PDF.
Resolution	Changed	Pages render at 144 DPI (1224×1584 pixels for Letter) and the TIFF stores that value in its XResolution and YResolution tags.
Compression	Changed	Every frame is deflate-compressed: the one-page sample is 65,202 bytes and the two-page deck 103,648 bytes.
Selectable text	Lost	The frames are pixels only; there is no text layer, so OCR must run on the TIFF to make it searchable again.
Colour	Changed	Frames are 8-bit RGB. There is no 1-bit or grayscale mode, so a black-and-white fax TIFF has to be produced elsewhere.
Transparency	Changed	Pages are opaque white paper unless transparent=true, which renders an RGBA frame with blank areas transparent.

Pages Kept
A two-page deck rendered into one TIFF with two frames; page order and count matched the PDF.
Resolution Changed
Pages render at 144 DPI (1224×1584 pixels for Letter) and the TIFF stores that value in its XResolution and YResolution tags.
Compression Changed
Every frame is deflate-compressed: the one-page sample is 65,202 bytes and the two-page deck 103,648 bytes.
Selectable text Lost
The frames are pixels only; there is no text layer, so OCR must run on the TIFF to make it searchable again.
Colour Changed
Frames are 8-bit RGB. There is no 1-bit or grayscale mode, so a black-and-white fax TIFF has to be produced elsewhere.
Transparency Changed
Pages are opaque white paper unless transparent=true, which renders an RGBA frame with blank areas transparent.

Sample conversions

One-page report

Input: sample.pdf, one Letter page with text and a table, 21,438 bytes.
Output: 1224×1584 RGB TIFF, 65,202 bytes, deflate, 144 DPI tag, in 45 ms.

Two-page slide deck

Input: A 2-page PDF rendered from a 16:9 presentation at 1440×811 per page.
Output: One 103,648-byte TIFF with two deflate frames; with multipage=false the same pages arrived as a ZIP of two single-page TIFFs (36,670 and 66,912 bytes).

A real PDF → TIFF run

We converted our PDF sample (21 KB) with Image engine on 2026-09-11. It took 45 ms and produced a 64 KB TIFF file, 3.0× larger than the input. The engine raised 1 warning, listed below.

Input · sample.pdf · 21 KB

PDF 1.7, 1 page, selectable text (LibertinusSerif-Bold-Identity-H, LibertinusSerif-Bold, LibertinusSerif-Regular-Identity-H, LibertinusSerif-Regular), 0 image objects

Version: 1.7
Pages: 1
Fonts: LibertinusSerif-Bold-Identity-H, LibertinusSerif-Bold, LibertinusSerif-Regular-Identity-H, LibertinusSerif-Regular
Images: 0
Text layer: yes

Output · sample.tif · 64 KB

1224 × 1584 px, deflate

Width: 1,224
Height: 1,584
Encoding: deflate

PDF pages rendered as images; selectable text is not preserved.

Is your file a scan?

Rendering a scanned PDF to TIFF simply re-encodes the scan pixels, so raise dpi to the scan's native resolution to avoid softening. If you need the words, PDF → TXT with AI Deep Read reads the pages directly for 1 credit each and skips the TIFF step.

Options and when to change them

dpi: Use 200 or 300 for OCR and archival scans; 144 is enough for previews and keeps files small.
multipage: Set it to false when a system ingests one image per page and rejects multi-frame TIFFs; you then get a ZIP.
max_pages: Cap it for long documents when only the first pages are needed.
transparent: Turn it on only for compositing; scanners, fax gateways and OCR expect opaque white pages.

Do it yourself

PyMuPDF and Pillow

bash

import fitz
from PIL import Image
import io

pages = [Image.open(io.BytesIO(p.get_pixmap(dpi=144).tobytes("png"))) for p in fitz.open("in.pdf")]
for p in pages: p.encoderinfo = {"compression": "tiff_deflate"}
pages[0].save("out.tiff", save_all=True, append_images=pages[1:], compression="tiff_deflate", dpi=(144, 144))

Without setting encoderinfo on every frame, Pillow writes the appended frames uncompressed.

Ghostscript

bash

gs -sDEVICE=tiff24nc -r144 -o out.tiff in.pdf

Use tiffg4 for 1-bit fax output; tiff24nc writes uncompressed RGB.

PDF to TIFF by API or MCP

The HTTP API and the MCP server run the exact engine this page uses (Image engine); the response carries the same warnings the web converter shows. Check support first with GET /api/v1/pairs?from=pdf&to=tiff.

curl

curl -X POST https://filetypeconverters.com/api/v1/convert \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $FTC_API_KEY" \
  -F "file=@input.pdf" -F "from=pdf" -F "to=tiff" \
  -F 'options={"dpi":96}' \
  --output output.tif

Options this engine accepts for PDF → TIFF

Key	Applies to	Type	Default
dpi	Reading PDF	number	96

API reference

When this is the wrong conversion

If you need one image per page for a web page, PDF → PNG returns a ZIP of PNGs that browsers can show; browsers do not display TIFF.
If the goal is a searchable archive, keep the PDF or run OCR on it; the TIFF has no text layer.
If a fax service wants 1-bit Group 4 TIFF, produce it with Ghostscript; this route writes 8-bit RGB frames.

PDF to TIFF questions

Does PDF → TIFF produce one file or one per page?

One multi-page TIFF by default, with each page as a frame. Set multipage to false to receive a ZIP of single-page TIFFs instead.

Is the resolution stored in the TIFF?

Yes. The dpi you choose (144 by default) is written to the resolution tags, so scanning software and OCR engines report the correct physical page size.

Can I get a black-and-white TIFF?

Not from this route; frames are 8-bit RGB with deflate compression. Convert with Ghostscript's tiffg4 device when a fax-style 1-bit file is required.