The right way to convert Word documents to PDF
By the Converterzilla Team
We build privacy-first PDF and image tools that run entirely in your browser. Our team has shipped JavaScript file-processing apps used by thousands every day, and we write here about the libraries, trade-offs and patterns we use.
Microsoft Word's "Save as PDF" looks great until you open it on a different computer and the fonts have shifted, the margins are off, and the table on page 4 has split across two pages. The cause is almost always the same: fonts.
The font embedding problem
If your document uses a font that's installed on your machine but not on the recipient's, Word can either embed it in the PDF (good) or substitute it (bad). Substitution shifts metrics, which shifts line breaks, which shifts page breaks. Suddenly page 4 looks different.
The fix
- Embed all fonts — In Word, File → Options → Save → "Embed fonts in the file"
- Use ISO PDF/A — when the recipient must open it correctly years later
- Avoid system-only fonts like Microsoft Sans Serif or San Francisco — they're not embeddable
Why a converter still helps
Even with embedding turned on, Word's export sometimes mishandles complex tables, inline equations, and images with text-wrapping. A purpose-built Word-to-PDF converter renders the document with LibreOffice or similar, producing more consistent output.
Hyperlinks and TOC
Make sure your converter preserves clickable links and table-of-contents jumps. Some converters flatten everything to images — fine for archival, terrible for navigation.
Our Word to PDF converter uses server-side LibreOffice to render documents faithfully. It's coming with the next backend release.