Why does my Word document look different once it is a PDF?

Almost always a font that did not embed, so the PDF reader substituted one with different widths. Check the font of the paragraph that moved, then look for compatibility mode and a print driver in the path.

Does Save As PDF keep the formatting better than Print to PDF?

Yes. Save As and Export share Word's own PDF writer, which embeds fonts and keeps the page geometry. Print to PDF goes through the printer pipeline, which scales, re-margins and drops the links.

Why do the page numbers change when I convert Word to PDF?

The two layout engines disagree by a few points, usually because the document is in compatibility mode or uses a font that is not installed. Fix the cause and the page count matches again.

Can I lock a PDF so the layout cannot reflow?

A PDF does not reflow by itself. Once the export matches the Word page, it stays that way in every reader. The variation is all on the Word side, before the export.

Do tables keep their borders and shading in a Word to PDF export?

Yes, with the exporter and with the browser converter. Very thin borders can disappear in a print driver route because the driver rounds them to zero width, which is one more reason not to print.

How does the browser converter know the format survived?

It reopens the PDF it wrote with a separate reader and counts the characters against the text the layout used. Below 98% there is no download. Page geometry is drawn from the document's own section settings.

Word to PDF without losing formatting

Word to PDF

How to convert Word to PDF without changing the format

Check the fonts

Open the font dialogue for a shifted paragraph. If the font name sits in brackets or shows a substitution warning, the font is not installed and Word is already guessing.
Turn off compatibility mode

Look at the title bar. If it says Compatibility Mode, choose File, Info, Convert, and let Word re-lay the document with the current layout engine.
Match the paper size

Set the page size in Layout to the size the PDF will be read at, A4 or Letter, and check that no exporter is set to scale to a different paper.
Convert and compare

Open the .docx in Word to PDF, or use File, Export in Word. Compare the page count and the last line of each page with the Word window.

Cause one: a font that did not embed

Word lays out the page with the fonts installed on your machine. The exporter embeds those fonts into the PDF so the reader draws the same shapes. When a font refuses to embed, because its licence forbids it or because it is a cloud font Word has not downloaded yet, the PDF reader substitutes a font with different letter widths and the lines rewrap. A paragraph grows by a line, the line pushes a heading to the next page, and the page count no longer matches.

Find the font in the Word document and replace it with one that embeds, or wait for the cloud font to finish downloading, which Word shows as a small icon in the font list. Fonts that ship with Windows and macOS embed without complaint. Fonts from a design bundle often do not, and the PDF is where you find out. A .docx can also carry its own fonts: File, Options, Save, Embed fonts in the file puts the face inside the document, and every converter, including the one in this tab, then draws with it.

Cause two: a print driver in the path

Microsoft Print to PDF, the macOS print dialogue and every third-party PDF printer render the document through the printer pipeline. That pipeline scales to the printer's paper, applies the printer's margins, and rasterises anything it cannot describe. Small shifts in spacing are the visible sign, and lost hyperlinks are the invisible one.

Use the exporter, which is a different program, or use the browser converter, which never goes near a printer. The steps inside Word are in Convert Word to PDF for both Windows and Mac. If the printer route is the only one you have, set its paper size to match the document and turn off any fit-to-page option before printing.

Cause three: compatibility mode

A .docx that began life as a .doc opens in compatibility mode, and Word lays it out with the older engine so it matches what the original author saw. The exporter uses the current engine. Table cell padding, line spacing and the position of floating pictures can all differ between the two by a few points, which is enough to push a paragraph onto the next page.

File, Info, Convert upgrades the document to the current format. Check the page count before and after. If it changed, the fix has already moved something, and you decide which layout you want before converting. Save a copy first, because the conversion cannot be undone once the file is closed.

Cause four: paper size and viewer scaling

A document laid out on Letter paper, exported by a Word set to A4, or read in a viewer that fits the page to the window, looks squeezed even though nothing moved. Check Layout, Size in Word, and check the export options for a paper size override. Then open the PDF at actual size before judging it.

Headers, footers and page numbers sit inside the margin area, which is the first thing a paper size change eats. If the page number vanished, this is the cause. The browser converter reads the section size and margins the document asks for and uses those, so a document set to A4 comes out as A4 pages whatever the machine's default paper is.

Word to PDF without changing font

The font in the PDF is the font the converter embedded, and nothing in an exporter swaps one for another on purpose. If the PDF shows a different typeface, the original was never installed on the machine that converted it. Word opened the document, could not find the font, and displayed a substitute on screen too, which is why the change is hard to spot until the PDF is compared with the author's copy.

Install the font, or agree a replacement with the author and change it in the styles rather than paragraph by paragraph. Heading and Normal styles carry most of a document, so two changes fix most of it. Word to PDF draws with the face the .docx embeds when there is one; otherwise it serves its own font subsets from this site, and only the parts holding the characters on your pages are fetched. The face can differ from the one Word shows, but every character is still drawn as text and counted afterwards.

Convert in this tab and read the receipt

The browser converter opens the OOXML package, resolves the styles each paragraph inherits, measures the text against real font metrics, breaks it into lines and places it on pages with the margins the document asks for. Tables, lists, footnotes, headers, footers, pictures, shapes, text boxes and charts are drawn. An embedded object another program owns, such as a spreadsheet dropped into the page, is left out and counted on the receipt instead of hidden.

Before the download appears the tool reopens the PDF it wrote with a separate reader and counts the non-space characters it finds. At least 98% of the text the layout used must come back, or there is no download. That number is the difference between a converter that changed the format and one that can show you it did not. Page breaks usually match Word and sometimes do not, because line breaking uses the metrics of the font the document names, and the text itself is never changed.

Prove the layout survived

Set the Word window and the PDF side by side and compare the last line of every page. That catches a reflow in seconds. For a long document, Compare PDF takes two PDFs and reports the changed, inserted and removed pages, so convert the document twice, from the original and from the fixed copy, and see exactly what moved.

Hyperlinks are the other casualty of a bad export, and the causes are different. They are in Word to PDF hyperlinks not working. The other Word guides are listed under PDF, Word, Excel and PowerPoint help.

Questions people ask

Why does my Word document look different once it is a PDF?: Almost always a font that did not embed, so the PDF reader substituted one with different widths. Check the font of the paragraph that moved, then look for compatibility mode and a print driver in the path.
Does Save As PDF keep the formatting better than Print to PDF?: Yes. Save As and Export share Word's own PDF writer, which embeds fonts and keeps the page geometry. Print to PDF goes through the printer pipeline, which scales, re-margins and drops the links.
Why do the page numbers change when I convert Word to PDF?: The two layout engines disagree by a few points, usually because the document is in compatibility mode or uses a font that is not installed. Fix the cause and the page count matches again.
Can I lock a PDF so the layout cannot reflow?: A PDF does not reflow by itself. Once the export matches the Word page, it stays that way in every reader. The variation is all on the Word side, before the export.
Do tables keep their borders and shading in a Word to PDF export?: Yes, with the exporter and with the browser converter. Very thin borders can disappear in a print driver route because the driver rounds them to zero width, which is one more reason not to print.
How does the browser converter know the format survived?: It reopens the PDF it wrote with a separate reader and counts the characters against the text the layout used. Below 98% there is no download. Page geometry is drawn from the document's own section settings.

Do it now

The tool runs in this browser. Your file never leaves the machine, and the result is checked before you download it.