Even after a decade, there’s no proper explanation about this choice or what Microsoft does with images in a PDF. This vaguely worded option badly needs clarification by Microsoft. The broad idea is making a PDF that can be viewed correctly without too many external links like fonts.īy default, PDF/A files are opened as Read Only but can be edited. PDF/A is a standard for long term archiving of documents. Unless you have a reason, leave this option on. To make the PDF more easily read by ‘text to voice’ and other accessibility features. Document structure tags for accessibility They can be useful searching for a PDF.Ĭomments property is not copied to PDF. Those choices are on the File | Save a Copy dialog. All you can do is choose large size (Best for printing) or smaller PDF (Best for electronic distribution and accessibility) – equivalent to the Standard and Minimum options in WinWord.

Word for Mac doesn’t have the all options available in Word for Windows. If you’re posting the PDF online (part of a intranet or web site) the smaller PDF will load in a browser more quickly. The main way a PDF is shrunk is by reducing the quality of images.Ī smaller PDF is good for faster sending via email or messaging service. Minimum size (publishing online) is the choice when PDF file size is a consideration. A larger PDF shared online will load more slowly, perhaps too slowly. The downside is the size of the PDF file which might be too big to send via email or messaging service. It’s the better choice for later printing or displaying on high-resolution screens. This creates a full-size PDF with good image quality on a par with the images in the original Word document. Standard (publishing online and printing)

Lower quality PDF (mostly image resolution) to make a smaller file size.Higher quality PDF making a larger file size.

Microsoft gives these options fancy names but they are really:

Word pdf saver