How to Redact PDF Content

Removing confidential information in your PDFs isn’t just used by government entities. You may find yourself needing to remove information from banking or credit card statements for accounting requests or needing to remove personally identifiable information (or PII for short) for business requests.

If you’re looking to black out text in a PDF or, as it’s formally called, redact, Xodo offers a simple and easy-to-use tool. This quick tutorial will explain how to redact PDFs on any device.

Permanently remove sensitive information in seconds

Using the online Redact PDF tool, all you need to do is follow the simple steps below.

1. Go to the Redact PDF tool.

2. Upload your PDF either from your device, Xodo Drive, or Google Drive, and Dropbox.

3. Once you’ve selected the PDF you want to remove information from, select Redact, then highlight the text or select a region you want removed from the page and mark them for redaction.

On the right side of the page, you will see all items you’ve marked for redaction. If you’ve made a mistake or changed your mind, you can undo, redo, or erase anything you’ve done using the appropriate buttons.

4. Once you’re ready to redact, click the Redact All button and then hit Apply.

Note that Xodo uses secure processing, ensuring that you and your document are safe.

Features, features, features

If you’re not familiar with the layout of the Redact PDF tool, finding your way around is easy, and we’re here to help!

All your flexible options:

Select and upload your file

You can upload your PDF file set for redaction from your device, Xodo Drive, Google Drive, or even Dropbox.

View Controls and side panel

Once you’ve uploaded your file, you can view the file in more detail using the view controls and side panel. You can even choose to multiselect pages at the bottom of the side panel.

Xodo redaction formatting options

Choose text, stroke, or fill. You can place text over your redacted information, stroke, or fill the information you want removed.

Quickly search for text to redact

Select text on the page and search for preset phone numbers, credit cards, and email addresses instantly.

Bulk select and unselect text for easy redaction

Xodo comes with the ability to let you redact text in bulk. Select which highlighted text you want to redact. Then quickly mark them for redaction or redact your selections on the spot.

Download and saving options

Download your redacted PDF to your device or keep your file in the cloud by saving it to Xodo Drive or Google Drive.

Get more work done with Xodo

Redact, convert, merge - the possibilities are endless with Xodo! Our Redact PDF tool uses an advanced PDF redaction library to provide high-end security. It was designed with you, the user, in mind to make sure your documents only display the information you want people to see.

You can use Xodo online on desktop and mobile using your Windows, Mac, iOS, or Android device. Our suite of more than 30 tools will enable you to edit, annotate, sign, and share PDFs all in one place.

Join Xodo to try out more capabilities with our 7-day Xodo Pro free trial and get access to even more tools you can integrate into your document processing routine to help make your workflows more efficient than ever!