PDF to ODG: Convert a PDF into a LibreOffice Draw File

PDF to ODG converts a PDF into an OpenDocument Graphics file, the native format of LibreOffice Draw. Each PDF page becomes a Draw page, so you can move text boxes, recolor shapes, add callouts or reuse a diagram in another drawing.

The conversion runs LibreOffice Draw's PDF import on our server. Upload one PDF, wait a moment, and download an ODG file. Nothing to install.

How to convert PDF to ODG

1. Click Choose Files or drag one PDF onto the page. It can be up to 25 MB.
2. Check the preview of your PDF.
3. Click Convert to ODG and wait while LibreOffice Draw imports the pages.
4. Download the ODG file and open it in LibreOffice Draw.

What is an ODG file?

ODG is the graphics member of the OpenDocument family. The OpenDocument article on Wikipedia lists .odg as the extension for graphics and notes that the format is an OASIS standard and the international standard ISO/IEC 26300.

LibreOffice Draw opens and saves ODG files directly. When you're done editing, Draw can export a new PDF, or you can use our ODG to PDF converter.

What you can edit after the import

In a PDF a program made, like an exported report or a diagram, text arrives as text boxes and drawings as shapes and lines. Select them in Draw and you can change the wording, move them or delete them.

The import usually chops text into lots of small boxes, often one per line. That's fine for fixing a label or a date. Rewriting long paragraphs is easier in a word processor.

Fonts the server doesn't have get replaced, so check headings and labels after the import. Pictures in the PDF stay pictures, and you can move, resize or crop them.

What happened when we tested PDF to ODG

We used test3.pdf, a small five-page test file of 2.0 KB. Back came test3_PDFToODG.odg, 11.2 KB, 0.8 seconds after we clicked Convert to ODG on our local test server.

There aren't any options to set, so the file went through as uploaded. Tested in October 2026.

What our test files turned into in Draw

In October 2026 we opened the ODG files from three PDFs and counted what was in each.

• test3.pdf has five square pages with one line of text each. It gave five Draw pages of 17.638 by 17.638 cm, each with a single text box holding that line.
• test1.pdf is a vector drawing of a hat, and it became one Draw page with five shapes and no picture at all. The drawing arrives as editable outlines, so you can recolor or reshape it.
• A two-page A4 report of 121.3 KB, with a photo, two text columns and a ruled table, became two A4 Draw pages: 55 text boxes (one per line), 13 line shapes for the rules and the photo as a picture. That ODG was 151.7 KB.

Text in a table doesn't become a table. Each cell is its own box, which is fine for correcting a figure but slow going if you want to add a row.

Does a PDF to ODG to PDF round trip change the page?

A little, even with no edits: fonts get swapped and photos get compressed again. We checked in October 2026 by converting the 121.3 KB report to ODG and straight back with ODG to PDF, without touching anything.

• The report used Helvetica without embedding it, and the new PDF embeds Arial and Arial Bold in its place.
• The photo is still 400 by 300 pixels, but saved again as a JPEG of 48.7 KB, down from 118 KB, so it loses some detail.
• Rendered at 100 dpi, 2.91% of page 1 (the page with the photo) and 0.37% of page 2 looked visibly different from the original.
• The file came out at 116.3 KB instead of 121.3 KB, still two A4 pages.

For a label fix in a diagram, none of that matters. For a page that has to stay byte for byte the same, like a signed form, keep the original and edit a copy.

ODT, ODP or ODG: which LibreOffice import to use

We ran the same report through all three. The objects came out nearly identical each time, so the choice comes down to which program you edit in and what you do next.

Go with PDF to ODT for text corrections, PDF to ODP for a slide show and ODG for anything drawn.

Which PDFs convert well, and which do not

Scanned PDFs are pictures of pages, and no OCR runs during the import. So a scan arrives in Draw as one image per page; if you need its text, run it through OCR PDF first.

A PDF that needs a password to open gets refused until the password is removed, for example with one of our PDF security tools. Files that aren't valid PDFs are refused too, and the tool checks that the result is a real ODG package before it offers you the download.

Forms, comments, digital signatures and embedded media have no equivalent on a Draw page. Keep the original PDF for your records, and if you only need a few pages in Draw, take out the rest first with our tools to organize PDF pages.

Frequently Asked Questions about PDF to ODG

What opens an ODG file?

LibreOffice Draw opens it directly. Other programs that support OpenDocument Graphics can open it too.

Does every PDF page become a Draw page?

Yes. The importer makes one Draw page for each page of the PDF.

Is the text editable?

In a PDF with real text, yes, as small text boxes. In a scanned PDF, no, because the page is a picture and no OCR runs.

Will the ODG look exactly like the PDF?

Usually close, but fonts the server lacks get replaced and complex effects can shift. Compare the ODG with the PDF before you rely on it.

Can I convert several PDFs at once?

No. The tool takes one PDF per conversion and gives you one ODG file.

How long do you keep my files?

The PDF and the ODG are deleted automatically within two hours.