Arabic document to PDF: why the result is rasterised

Why you’d do this

Turning a Markdown file, some pasted HTML, or plain text into a PDF sounds like it should be a one-line job. It mostly is — for English. For Arabic, the letters in a word have to connect to each other correctly and the whole line has to read right-to-left, and a lot of PDF tools that work perfectly well for English quietly get this wrong: letters that should join sit apart from each other, or the reading order comes out scrambled. Dzzz’s Document to PDF tool exists to get that right, and the way it gets it right is worth understanding before you download the result.

How, with the named tool

1. Pick the source. Choose Markdown, HTML or Plain text, so your content is read the right way.
2. Add your content. Paste or type it into the Content box, or tap “Choose a file” for a .md, .html or .txt file. Picking images instead switches the tool to placing one image per page.
3. Set up the page. Under Page setup, choose A4 or Letter, portrait or landscape, a margin (Normal, Narrow or Wide), and a quality of 2× (recommended) or 3× (sharper). A live preview of the first page updates as you type.
4. Download the PDF. Tap Download PDF.
5. Or tap Print… instead, for text you can select and search — see below for the difference.

What to watch for

The shaping problem is why the download works the way it does. PDF libraries that draw text directly — including the one under the hood here — place Arabic letters as separate, disconnected shapes in their original left-to-right order, because that’s how the underlying drawing call works. Real Arabic needs each letter shaped according to its neighbours and the whole line reversed for right-to-left reading, and a direct text-drawing call in a PDF library does neither. Getting that right needs a real text-layout engine — the kind a browser already has — so Document to PDF lays your content out in the browser first, where Arabic shapes and reads correctly, and then turns each page into an image before building the PDF from those images.

That’s why the downloaded PDF’s text isn’t selectable or searchable, and is larger than a normal PDF — stated plainly, not a hidden trade-off. Every page in the download is a picture of that page, not text characters in the PDF’s own structure. You can’t select a word to copy it, a PDF reader’s search box won’t find anything in it, and the file is bigger than a text-based PDF of the same content, because it’s carrying images instead of characters.

For selectable, searchable text, use Print… instead. That’s a separate, secondary path: it opens your device’s own print dialog on the same content, and choosing “Save as PDF” there produces a PDF with real, selectable text — because that PDF is built by the browser and operating system’s print pipeline, not by rasterising pages. Reach for Print… specifically when you need someone to search the PDF, copy text out of it, or have a screen reader read it as text rather than an image.

Quality is a direct size trade: 3× is sharper and noticeably bigger. The 2× (recommended) setting is the reasonable default for most documents; 3× (sharper) renders every page at higher resolution before it’s turned into an image, which means finer detail in small text but a distinctly larger download. If the file size matters — you’re emailing it, or a portal caps upload size — try 2× first and only step up to 3× if the text genuinely needs to look sharper, for example a document with very small print or fine diagrams.

FAQ

Why can’t I select or search the text in my downloaded PDF?

Because the download is built from images of each page, not from PDF text objects — that’s a deliberate choice, not a bug, made specifically so Arabic text shapes and reads correctly. If you need selectable or searchable text, use the Print… button instead of Download PDF, and choose “Save as PDF” in the print dialog that opens.

Does the Print… path handle Arabic correctly too?

Yes — it renders the exact same content through your browser’s own print pipeline, which shapes and orders Arabic text the same way the on-screen preview does. The difference from Download PDF is only in how the result is built: Print… keeps real text in the PDF, while Download PDF turns each page into an image.

Should I always use 3× quality to be safe?

No — 2× is the recommended default and is sharp enough for most documents on a screen or a normal printer. Reach for 3× only when the text is small or the document has fine detail that needs to hold up under closer inspection, since it makes the file noticeably larger for that extra sharpness.