Remove a PDF Password

We rate this tip B tier: it works, it is free, and it is a blunt tool. Printing an opened PDF to the "Microsoft Print to PDF" printer writes a new file with no password on it, and in our test on Nov 10, 2026 that new file had also lost its link, its bookmarks, its form field and its selectable text. Adobe documents the same move for its own printer: an owner who has forgotten a permissions password can print the file as an Adobe PDF to make it editable again. The clean way, turning the password off in Acrobat, keeps everything, so the print trick is for the bank statement you are tired of unlocking, not for a document whose insides matter.

We think Microsoft Print to PDF still has no setting to put a password on its output a year from now, so a reprint keeps coming out unlocked. Confidence: Likely. Check by: Nov 2027.

The steps

George Vanous's notes hold this one as a single line, undated: "To remove the password in a PDF document, print it to the "Microsoft Print to PDF" printer." And then: "Voila! No more password." Spelled out:

1. Open the PDF in any program that can show it, a browser included, and type the password when asked. This step is the whole condition: the trick does nothing for a file you cannot open.
2. Press Ctrl + P. In Microsoft Edge that opens the print window (Print in Microsoft Edge, Microsoft Support).
3. Under Printer, choose Microsoft Print to PDF.
4. Select Print. Nothing goes to paper: Windows asks where to save, and you give the copy a new name.
5. Open the copy. It asks for nothing.

Keep the original. The copy is a lesser file, as the test below shows.

Two passwords, and which one this beats

Adobe's password overview describes two kinds. A Document Open Password must be typed before the PDF shows at all. A Permissions Password lets anyone read the file but restricts features such as printing, editing, copying content and adding comments.

• Open password, and you know it: the print trick removes it. You are saving yourself the typing, nothing more.
• Open password, and you do not know it: nothing here helps, by design.
• Permissions password with printing allowed: printing makes an unrestricted copy. This is the case Adobe's own regain-access page covers.
• Permissions password with printing set to None: the author has switched printing off (the choices are None, Low Resolution at up to 150 dpi, and High Resolution), so a viewer that honors the setting will not print, and the trick stops at step 2. We did not test this case.

What we tested

On Nov 10, 2026, on a Windows 11 Home PC (build 26300), we made a two-page PDF of our own with real text, one web link, two bookmarks and one fillable form field, then locked it with an open password using AES 256-bit encryption. A PDF library confirmed the locked file would not open without the password. We opened it with the password, sent both pages to the Microsoft Print to PDF printer through Windows' print system, and inspected what came out.

The copy named its maker in its own properties: "Microsoft: Print To PDF". The password was gone, exactly as his note says.

Two limits on that test, stated plainly. We fed the printer page images from a script, not from Edge's print window, so the loss of selectable text is a result of our method: a viewer that sends text to the printer as text may leave it selectable, and we did not measure which viewers do. The loss of links, bookmarks and form fields is not a quirk of our method. A printer receives pages, not a document's structure, so none of those can travel through one. For the same reason a digital signature cannot survive, because the copy is a different file from the one that was signed; we did not test a signed PDF.

The cleaner way, if you have Acrobat

Adobe's steps keep the file intact: in Acrobat, open All tools, then Protect a PDF, then Set security properties; on the Security tab choose Change Settings, clear the box that requires a password to open the document (or the one that restricts editing and printing), type the permissions password if asked, and save. Adobe's overview describes these password types as features of Acrobat Pro, its paid editor, which is why the free printer is the route most people take.

Whose file it is

A password on a PDF is someone's decision. Removing it from your own statement, payslip or ticket, which you could open anyway, changes nothing about who may read it except that the copy on your disk is now unprotected: treat it as you would a printout left on a desk. Adobe frames its own instructions the same way, for a person who owns the PDF. A file you received under restrictions is the sender's call, not a printing problem.

What we checked

Microsoft Print to PDF is installed on the test PC (its printer port is the kind that prompts for a file name), and the trick did what the note claims. Adobe's four help pages were read on Nov 10, 2026. Microsoft's Edge help page confirms the Ctrl + P step but never names the printer, and we found no Microsoft help article devoted to Microsoft Print to PDF on that date, only community question threads, which we do not cite. The date George wrote the note is unknown.

Sources

• George Vanous's notes, undated
• Regain access to locked PDFs, Adobe Help Center, last updated Dec 5, 2025
• Remove passwords from PDFs, Adobe Help Center, last updated Oct 22, 2026
• Password security overview, Adobe Help Center, last updated Oct 22, 2026
• Restrict printing, editing, and copying PDFs, Adobe Help Center, last updated Oct 22, 2026
• Print in Microsoft Edge, Microsoft Support, read Nov 10, 2026
• Vi.ki's own test on Windows 11 Home, Nov 10, 2026