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How to White Out a Line in a PDF

White-out has been a popular tool for correcting typed documents since its invention in the 1950s to edit the work of typewriters. PDFs today offer a similarly difficult challenge to edit, as they are fixed layout documents and not meant to be fluid, editable documents like your typical Word or Pages files. Because many PDFs pass back and forth through your small business on any given day, not being able to make small changes directly on these documents is really inconvenient.

However, it is possible to “white out” PDF documents to correct typos, update paragraphs or add additional text. You can do so either through Adobe’s Acrobat program or through a Microsoft Word workaround.

How to White Out PDFs in Adobe Acrobat.

It is possible to add, correct and update text in a PDF file without having to go back to your original document editor. Inside Adobe Acrobat, there is a tool called Edit Text & Images. This allows you to replace, edit or add any text contained inside any PDF file. It also lets you change the font or size of whole paragraphs as well.

Here’s how to use the Edit Text & Images feature to “white out” a line of text directly in Adobe Acrobat:

  1. First, select the Tools drop-down from the main menu bar. Select Edit PDF, and click Edit.
  2. You should now see all the text on your PDF document that can be changed inside a text box. These text boxes are separate from each other to not disrupt the flow of the rest of the document.
  3. Now, select the box with the text in it you want to “white out" by clicking your cursor where you want to make your change. Select the entire chunk of text, and press Delete/Backspace.
  4. If you want to replace the text with something else, you can do so by simply typing your new text into the same space where your old text was.
  5. If you want to “white out” an entire text box, you can do so by selecting the entire thing and hitting Delete/Backspace.
  6. Once your edits are complete, go to the Acrobat top bar and select File, then Save As to resave your edited PDF as a fixed-layout PDF.

White Out PDFs From Scanned Documents in Acrobat.

When you scan a document onto your computer, you usually convert and save it as a PDF. Let’s say you want to white out your new PDF to change a digital version of a scanned document. You can do that with Adobe Acrobat.

When you open your scanned PDF in Acrobat, the program will run something called optical character recognition, which converts the fixed layout into an editable version of the document in question. Make sure the Recognize Text option is toggled on, which it should be by default, for this to work. If it is, any document that you open with Acrobat will automatically become editable when you follow the same steps in the previous section.

How to White Out PDFs with Microsoft Word.

If you do not have Adobe Acrobat, then you will need to use the Microsoft Word workaround. This means you will need to convert the PDF document to a Microsoft Word document to “white out” the section in question, then re-create it as a PDF. Here’s how:

  1. First, open Microsoft Word. Select File from the main menu, and then click Open.
  2. Choose the PDF you want to open, and open it.
  3. At this point, a window will pop up asking you for permission to convert the PDF into a Word Document. What it is actually doing is making a copy of the PDF, so the original PDF document isn’t changed. Click OK.
  4. Check this copy for any obvious formatting changes in the copy process. According to Microsoft, certain lines or pages may end up breaking at different locations as the information is copied over. 
  5. Once you have corrected any formatting mistakes, edit the section you want to white out like you would in any other Word document.
  6. Now, go back to File. Click Save As, and select PDF as the format to save the document as from the File Format selection box.
  7. Click Export, and your new, revised PDF is ready to open.

What About Third Party White-Out Apps?

While not a “white-out app” necessarily, there are many third party PDF editor apps. However, if you have Adobe Acrobat or Microsoft Word, you shouldn’t need to use them. If you do need to use a third party PDF editor white-out app, you can try PDFelement for Windows or PDFExpert for Mac. They are both solid PDF editor apps with free trial versions, but do require you to use the paid versions to take advantage of all the features.