Add a watermark to a PDF

Stamp text or an image across pages, with opacity and rotation control.

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How to watermark a PDF

  1. 01

    Add your PDF

    Drop a file into the box above and its pages render as thumbnails.

  2. 02

    Write your text

    Type anything, or use one of the presets like CONFIDENTIAL or DRAFT.

  3. 03

    Set the look

    Adjust size, angle, opacity and colour, and check the preview beside the controls.

  4. 04

    Choose pages and download

    Select specific pages, or select nothing to watermark the whole document.

A watermark is not protection

This is the most important thing on the page, and most tools do not say it. A watermark is drawn onto the page as ordinary content. It marks a document — it does not secure one.

Anyone with a PDF editor can select the watermark and delete it. Anyone without one can rasterise the page, crop it, or simply retype the contents. If your goal is to stop a document being opened, use Protect PDF to encrypt it. If the goal is to remove sensitive content permanently, use Redact PDF, which destroys the underlying text rather than covering it.

What a watermark is genuinely good for is context. It tells the reader this is a draft, an unsigned copy, or an internal document — which stops the honest mistakes that make up most document mishaps.

Getting the opacity right

The default of 20% is deliberate. A watermark has to be visible enough to register and faint enough that the document underneath stays readable — past about 40%, body text starts fighting with it.

The stamp is drawn using multiply blending, so it darkens what is beneath rather than washing it out. That keeps black text on white paper sharp under a grey diagonal, which plain transparency does not.

Repeat across the page tiles the text edge to edge. It is far harder to crop out than a single centred stamp, at the cost of a busier document.

Frequently asked questions

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