How to email large PDF files.

A woman opens a large PDF file on her laptop.

Need to send a large file? Learn how to email multi-page PDFs for free from any computer.

Most email platforms limit file sizes to around 20MB. If you need to send a PDF that’s larger than 20MB, you’ll have to make the file smaller or find another way to share your PDF. Here’s the best way to compress large PDFs to make them more email-friendly.

Compressing PDF files for email.

File compression involves taking the original PDF and compressing the data so the total file size is smaller. By compressing PDFs, you can reduce the file size by 20% to 30%, making it possible to email large PDF files without compromising quality or readability.

How to compress PDFs online for free.

It might sound like a project to compress data in a PDF, but it’s actually quite easy with an online PDF editor like Adobe Acrobat online services. With an online PDF editor, you can compress PDFs up to 2GB in four easy steps:

  1. Go to the Acrobat online PDF compressor.
  2. Upload the file you want to compress and select your desired level of compression.
  3. Let the software do its magic.
  4. Download the compressed file to your device.

Online PDF editors let you compress PDFs quickly and easily from any device. Since the entire process is done online, there’s no need to download software or worry about compatibility issues. Plus, it’s completely free to try.

Once you download the compressed PDF, you can email the file without fighting error messages for going over the file size limit.

How to send a large PDF through Gmail.

Through Gmail you can send up to 25MB of files, which may not be enough when sharing a large PDF report or a document full of many photos. Large files uploaded to your Gmail from your computer can be difficult or even impossible to send, but thanks to the Google Drive shortcut, it’s possible to send large files through your Gmail account. Share a large PDF through your Gmail account with these simple steps.

  1. Upload your desired file to your Google Drive.
  2. From there, go to your Gmail and start a draft.
  3. In your Gmail draft, there’s an option to select a file from your Google Drive. Choose your file from there, and be sure to adjust your sharing settings so that the receiver has access to the file.

The receiver should be able to view your file with ease thanks to the Google Drive file-sharing features.

How to email large PDF files in Outlook.

Outlook allows users about 20MB of file space per email, but this may differ if your Outlook account is through your company, as they may limit sizes even more. There are a couple different ways you can share large PDF files through Outlook.

Method 1: Zip the file.

Right-click or control-click on your file and select Compress. A new file will be added to your desktop with the same name as the original file with a .zip extension. If you have multiple files that you wish to compress, make a folder with the files you want to zip, then right-click or control-click and select Compress.

Method 2: Use Dropbox.

Dropbox makes it easy to upload large videos, photos, and other file types all in one place. It also acts as an easy way to share large files that cannot be uploaded and sent over email. To start, upload your PDF to Dropbox. From there, you can create a link to email whoever else needs access to the file.

Discover more about how Adobe Acrobat and Acrobat online services make it easy to manage and compress PDFs online from any device.