Remove Annotations
Strip comments, highlights, sticky notes and links out of a PDF. Remove everything, or choose which annotation types to clear.
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About This Tool
A document that has been through review carries the whole argument with it: three rounds of comments, someone highlighting in yellow and someone else in green, and sticky notes debating a clause that was cut two versions ago. None of that should go to the client.
This clears the markup and leaves the document. You can remove everything in one pass, or select the types to strip - comments, highlights, sticky notes, drawing markup, or links - which is useful when you want the highlights gone but the hyperlinks working.
Removing annotations also removes the names attached to them. Reviewer identity is stored in the annotation metadata, so stripping comments is a privacy step as much as a tidiness one.
How to Use
Load the reviewed PDF
Drop in the file. The tool counts the annotations it finds and lists them by type.
Choose what to remove
Clear everything, or tick the types you want gone and leave the rest.
Remove and download
Save the clean document. Page content is untouched.
Use Cases
Sending a clean final version
Three rounds of internal comments removed before the document leaves the building.
Reusing last year template
An annotated draft becomes a blank starting point again in one step.
Removing reviewer names
Comment metadata carries author names. Stripping annotations removes the audit trail of who objected to what.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does this delete text that was added as an annotation?
Yes - free-text annotations are annotations. If someone typed a correction as a text box, it goes with the rest, so check the file afterwards.
Are redactions removed too?
No. A completed redaction has already removed the underlying content, so there is no annotation left to strip.
Can I keep the hyperlinks?
Yes. Deselect links and only the visual markup is removed.
What about form fields?
Form fields survive - they are a separate structure. Use Flatten PDF if you want those made non-editable as well.