How to Save an Email as a PDF

Sometimes you might receive important information in the body of an email. You don’t want to lose it, so converting the contents to PDF can help you to keep the information safe - and save you trawling through a busy inbox. Whether you want to save an Outlook email down as a PDF or you’re a Gmail user, the process is very similar.

Discover how to save an email as a PDF by reading our handy guide.

What you’ll learn.
 


Quick list: saving an email as a PDF.

Follow these simple steps to save your email as a PDF.

  1. Find your email. Open the email in your inbox that you intend to save as a PDF document.
  2. Start the download. Click the Print option.
  3. Select the PDF option. When the printer menu opens, select Save as PDF from the destination drop-down menu.

In detail: how to save an email as a PDF step by step.
 

In this example we will use the Gmail platform to illustrate how to save an email as a PDF. Other email providers may have slightly different steps, but the same principles will apply whether you are using Gmail, Outlook or any other email service.
 

1.    Open up your email inbox so that your screen displays a list of your most recent emails.

 

2.    Open up the email that you want to save to PDF by hovering over it with your cursor and left-clicking.

3.    The email will then open.

4.    Click the Print icon. If there is no Print icon on your screen, click the three dots to bring up the Options menu and then click Print.

5.    This will then bring up the Print Menu.    

6.    In the Destination drop down menu where the name of your printer is displayed, left click and select the Save as PDF option.

7.    After selecting this option, click the blue Save button in the bottom right hand corner of the screen.

8.    You will then be prompted to choose a location on your PC or laptop to save the PDF to. At this stage you will also be able to rename your document.

9.    Click the save button, ensuring that you select Adobe Acrobat Document (*.pdf) from the Save as type drop-down menu to be able to easily access your document in the future.

10.    Finally, to double check that your document has saved correctly, find it in its saved location and open it with Adobe Acrobat.

11.    The document should look something like this:

Benefits of saving emails as PDFs.


Now you have learnt how to download an email as a pdf, you can start to reap the rewards. Here are three important benefits.

 

  • Organisation. If someone sends you an important email that you know you are going to need for future reference, you can now download and store it in a specially labelled folder. This means no frantic searching through collapsed email conversations to find documents.
     
  • Editing. If you have been sent an email containing instructions and you need to annotate it with notes, you can do so quickly and easily using Adobe Acrobat after saving the email as a PDF.

  • Off-line accessibility. If you are travelling to the airport and need a digital copy of your boarding pass, you can now access it on your phone or tablet without mobile data or a Wi-Fi connection. Simply email the new PDF format of your boarding pass to yourself and download it to your mobile device.

FAQs.

 

Still have a couple of questions about downloading emails as PDFs? Read on for extra hints and tips.

 

How do I convert multiple emails to PDF?
 

If you would like to convert multiple emails to PDF individually, you can do so by following the tips above for every email you want to convert. If you want to combine all of your downloaded emails into one longer PDF, open Adobe Acrobat and use the Insert From File tool to combine your documents.

 

Can I do this on mobile or tablet?
 

Follow the steps above to save an email as a pdf on a mobile device. If you want a complete guide on how to download PDFs your mobile or tablet, check out the Adobe Community for helpful tips.

 

Is PDF editing free?
 

You can edit your PDF for free here. To benefit from the complete functionality Adobe Acrobat can offer, sign up for a subscription. Check out current Acrobat subscription pricing.

Related Acrobat content.

To get more out of your Acrobat experience, check out these related tips and guides.

 

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