Selecting and copying text in a PDF file

You can select and copy text from a PDF file, then paste it into another application, such as a word processor.

To copy text, choose Tools > Text Tool and drag over the text as you normally would. Then choose Edit > Copy. With some PDF files, line breaks are not saved when you copy text, so when you paste the text, the lines all run together.
To select only a portion of text horizontally (for example, to select only one column in a two-column document), choose Tools > Text Tool, then press the Option key and select the text.

See also