What is PDF/A

Audrey Goodwin

2020-05-27 17:11:44 • Filed to: PDF Knowledge • Proven solutions

If you work with many different PDF files on a regular basis, you will notice that some of them can no longer be opened with the latest document applications. To ensure that recently created PDF files are compatible with different browsers and emerging future applications, PDFs need to be optimised to a standard format known as PDF/A. In this article, we will define PDF/A and PDF/A-2B. We'll also look at the benefits of changing PDF files to this standard format, and the best software to use to save your PDF to PDF/A format.

# 1: What is PDF/A
# 2: Advantages of Conforming PDF to PDF/A
# 3: How to Save PDF as PDF/A

What is PDF/A

PDF/A: PDF/A format is a PDF ISO standardized format that supports archiving of files for future use. These files can be opened by any software or operating system without losing its formatting, color, hypertext and fonts. PDF/A format only applies to electronic documents. You can optimize and compress these documents. However, you cannot encrypt, add audios or videos, embed content or add external references. The first PDF/A format was published in 2005 as PDF/A with two levels PDF/A-1A and PDF/A -1B.

PDF-A/2B: PDF/A-2B is also an ISO standardized PDF format which is part two of the PDF/A. It was first introduced in June of 2011. This format has extra features compared to PDF/A, such as JPG image compression, digital signatures, and embedded fonts just like PDF/A-2A. However, level 2B needs to have a Unicode mapping.

Advantages of Conforming PDF to PDF/A

Having looked at the definition of PDF/A and PDF/A-2b you may ask yourself why it is necessary to change your PDF file to this standard format. Well, by now the most obvious benefit is that this format is reliable for future use since it can be opened by any device or software. Plus, a PDF/A document is a digital file that can be easily searched through.

In a scenario where the file was scanned, most PDF tools have OCR functionality thus making it possible to search through the PDF files. Furthermore, with PDF/A -2B file, you will be able to add digital signatures. If you are pondering on how to do this, software such as Wondershare PDFelement 6 Professional is equipped with this feature. It is, therefore, worth converting or saving your files to PDF/A format since it a productive format.

PDFelement - Save PDF as PDF/A

As mentioned above, PDFelement is a modern PDF tool that allows you to save your PDF to PDF/A format. Once you have opened the file in this program, you can save it to a PDF/A format like PDF/A-2b. Plus, with PDFelement, you will be able to edit form fields, batch extract data from forms, export data, import data and also create PDF forms. Its user interface is simple, and lets you easily edit text in your PDF documents by modifying, adding, or deleting text and images. You can also modify the pages of a PDF document to keep it clean and organised.

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Key features:

This PDF tool allows you to scan, edit and convert imaged based files using its inbuilt OCR technology.
It is a PDF creator that can convert Office documents, images, HTML and text to PDF.
You can comment on PDFs with sticky notes, notes, textboxes, callout comments, highlights and others.
It can split large PDF files or merge multiple PDF files at once.
It allows you to format your PDF by adding headers, footer, and bates numbering.
It is a PDF converter that supports output formats such Word, Excel, PowerPoint, HTML, Rich Text, Plain Text and images.
It is also a PDF viewer that allows you view PDFs with preferred layout settings.
It can also encrypt PDF files with passwords and permission restrictions.
You can add electronic and digital signatures to PDF files.