When to use Folio — six jobs that match the three tabs

These are packets, extracts and transmission copies. They are not OCR, e-sign, Word export or a vault. If the file must leave the device, this is the wrong site.

Open the mergerSplit a PDF

Each job below names the first tab, the honest failure, and the page that is not this one. Gmail numbers live on the email size guide. Photographs of paper live on scans. Chat sends live on WhatsApp. How-to mechanics: merge, split, compress. This URL is the map, not a fourth tool.

1. A landlord packet from three PDFs

You have a signed lease, a scan of an ID, and a proof-of-income letter, each saved as its own PDF from different apps. The portal wants one attachment. That is merge. Open the homepage, drop the three files, put the lease first, download one packet. Nothing in that flow creates an account or sends the ID to a conversion company.

If the ID is a photograph and the portal printed “PDF, 10 MB”, merge will not save you. The weight is the picture. Compressing the letter is theatre. Split the lease only if the checklist named specific clause pages. Recapture the card in document mode, then merge again. That honesty is the scans guide, not a hidden downsample button on this page.

Order, paper size, fillable forms

Order mistakes are the common failure: if the ID lands in the middle of the lease, use the arrows before Merge, or split the lease and rebuild. Page size differences (A4 lease plus a phone-photo PDF) are allowed. Folio does not rescale pages to one paper size. If the portal asked for PDF/A, this merge will not produce PDF/A. Keep fillable official forms out of the packet — merge copies pages and often drops the form catalog. Flatten first, or keep that form as its own upload if a second field exists.

Keep the three originals. Closing the tab discards the bytes. Email the download from your own mail app if a human still needs it. Caps after merge: email size.

2. The signature page from a 40-page NDA

Counsel sent a long NDA. Counterparty wants only the signature leaf on file, or you want page 40 without the commercial terms sitting in a shared folder. That is split, not merge. Open Split, drop the NDA, type the last page number as Folio counts it — file order, not the footer if those disagree. Range mode returns one PDF of that page.

If you also need the definitions section, add it to the same range list: 3-5, 40 still produces one file. If they asked for separate attachments, switch to one-PDF-per-page and unzip. Do not upload the NDA to a cutter that files the document under a job ID. Folio never sees the clauses. Password-protected NDAs have to be unlocked in Preview or Acrobat first. We will not take the password.

Split is not redaction. Pages you did not extract are simply not in the new file. They are not blacked out. If the leftover file still sits in a shared folder, the clauses are still there. After the extract you can merge that leaf with a covering note. Compress is rarely needed for a one-page extract. Do not run compress on the full NDA “to make split faster”. Mechanics: how to split in the browser.

If the NDA is huge because it is a scan of initials on every page, split still copies pages, but a phone tab may die. Use a laptop. That weight is a scan problem, explained on scans.

3. A brochure that Gmail will not take

Gmail still refuses many attachments around 25 MB. MIME encoding adds about a third, so a 22 MB file on disk can leave as a 29 MB message. A product brochure exported from InDesign or PowerPoint often overshoots because of unused objects, embedded fonts and metadata — not because every page is a photograph. Drop it on Compress, start with Balanced, read before and after. The numbers: email size guide.

If the file is a scan of printed pages, stop expecting a miracle. Folio will not shrink photos of paper. Photograph the brochure again at a lower resolution, or use a dedicated scan compressor you installed. If the file is a digital export and Balanced barely moved the needle, try Maximum once (title and author gone) and, if it is still huge, split out the pages the recipient actually named.

Merge is the wrong first click unless you were asked to combine the brochure with a price list. Do not merge extra catalogues into the same attachment and wonder why Gmail still refuses it. Keep the InDesign or PPT source. Folio output is for sending, not for going back to layout. A print shop that asked for the master should get the master — that job is case 6 below, not this one.

iPhone: if Safari reloads, the file is too heavy for that tab. Try a laptop. The brochure never left the device in either case. Folio’s own 80 MB guard is RAM, not Gmail’s cap. Do not “compress until 80” and expect mail to smile. Presets: High, Balanced, Maximum.

4. A school or HR portal with one upload slot

Five files: a diploma scan, a transcript, an ID page, a signed disclosure, a one-page cover letter. The portal shows a single PDF field. That is a merge job — after each piece fits. Open the homepage, drop the five files, put the cover letter first if they asked for it, download one packet.

The diploma photograph is usually the piece that does not fit. An 18 MB colour photo into a 10 MB slot will fail whether you merge or not. Compressing the cover letter is theatre. Split is only useful if they asked for one page of the transcript. Honest path: recapture the diploma smaller in the scanner app’s document preset, then merge. Details sit on scans because this is a picture-of-paper problem, not a metadata problem.

Keep fillable HR forms out of this merge if you still need to type into them. Flatten the official form first, or upload that form in a second field if the portal allows it. Order mistakes are common. If the ID lands between diploma pages, use the arrows. Page sizes will not be normalized. Portals rarely care. Print shops do. This packet is for the portal, not a plotter.

Do not upload the ID “to a better merger” because Folio felt slow on a phone. A slow tab is RAM. Use a laptop. If after merge the portal still rejects size, read email size even when the slot is not mail — the same MIME-shaped numbers show up as “10 MB PDF”. Do not loop Compress on the merged packet hoping the picture will collapse.

5. WhatsApp or Telegram will not send the PDF

This is not the Gmail case with the word WhatsApp pasted in. Chat fails earlier, on phones, on mobile data, and when someone shares a PDF through the camera roll so the other person receives a blurry image. Folio does not send into WhatsApp. You compress or split here, download, then attach as a document from Files, not from Photos. The full walkthrough is send a PDF in WhatsApp.

If you can select text in the deck, open Compress, Balanced first. If after-size barely moved, the deck is full of photos of slides — treat it as a scan. If they only asked for two pages of notes, split. Range mode, one PDF. Do not merge extra catalogues “so they have everything”. Chat caps punish generosity. A group is harsher than a DM.

Status, stickers and View Once are not PDF tools. Do not screenshot an NDA into the chat. Do not send a passport as a photo “because document failed”. Live Photos and HEIC files are the wrong site — this domain is PDF only. iPhone Safari: keep the tab in the foreground until the download finishes, then Files → WhatsApp → document. AirDrop from a laptop if the phone tab dies. Nothing was uploaded in either case.

Telegram, Signal and iMessage have their own moods. Folio does not negotiate with any of them. WhatsApp Business may cap documents by company policy. We cannot see that policy and we will not open a WhatsApp API. There is no account on this site.

6. A print shop wants the original, a client wants an email copy

Those are two files. The shop asked for the InDesign or Acrobat export. The client asked for something that fits in mail. Compress the digital export for mail. Do not hand the shop the compressed copy as a new master. Folio does not downsample images and does not produce PDF/X.

A scan of a printed brochure will not become an email file here. Re-export from layout with smaller images, or screenshot less. Then, if the wrapper is still sloppy, Balanced can trim leftover objects. Merge is the wrong first click unless the client also wanted a price list stapled to the brochure. Split is useful if they only needed pages 2–5 of a 20-page lookbook.

Forms, optional content groups and printer’s marks may not survive compress. Treat Folio output as a transmission copy. Keep the press PDF on disk with a name that says MASTER. If the shop’s machine rejects the email copy later, that is expected: you sent them the wrong file. Send the master. Folio did not convert colour spaces. Related: email, scans, how to compress.

Jobs this site will not pretend to do

OCR. E-sign. PDF to Word or Excel. Unlock a password. Host a file for a sharing link. Mint PDF/A or PDF/X. Downsample a photograph of an ID “just this once”. Those products exist elsewhere and they change the privacy bargain. If Folio cannot do the job, the page should say so. That refusal is the product, not a defect. Short answers: FAQ. Operator: about Folio. Inbox: contact — do not attach the PDF in the first mail.

Open the mergerSplit a PDF