PDFs aren’t just for reproducing digital versions of glossy brochures or displaying scanned pages from a book. Across industries, there are many times when PDFs will contain critical data points contained within tables. These could be digitized files of old accounting records, historical performance data, or employee data — practically anything you can imagine in a table. So long as this data remains within the PDF, though, it’s only good for reference. You cannot modify or analyze the data with spreadsheet functions until you move the information into a program such as excel.

Copy and paste functions often won’t accurately transfer tabular data from a PDF into a spreadsheet. Manually moving the information by retyping requires far too much time and effort. The best choice in this instance is to convert the PDF straight into a spreadsheet. With Tungsten Power PDF, it’s effortless to convert PDF to excel even when you have dozens or even hundreds of files to process. Let’s explore how.

Using power PDF to swap from PDF to excel

The easiest way to bulk convert PDF in this software is to use the built-in convert assistant. This useful tool will make it easy for you to specify all the files you wish to convert for simultaneous processing. Keep in mind that this method works best when the files primarily contain tables. For PDFs that are mostly text with only a few tables, you will need to use the export area tool instead. First, here’s how to use convert assistant:

1. In Power PDF, click advanced processing. On this ribbon, locate the group labeled “Batch” and click the converter button to launch the convert assistant.
2. Drag and drop files from the macOS Finder or Windows Explorer into the software, or use the “Add” button to select all the files you wish to convert.
3. In output format, select Microsoft Excel.
4. Specify a destination folder for the converted files.
5. Press convert to start the process. Power PDF automatically processes all the documents you selected and outputs them into the .xls format.

Related: How to convert PDF to excel with power PDF

Working with tabular data in Power PDF is easy. When you only want to grab specific tables from a file, you will need to click “export area” in the advanced processing ribbon instead. Click and drag to draw a box around a table, then name your new file. With the combination of convert assistant and export area, it’s easy to convert PDF tables to excel.

Discover a faster way to convert and edit PDFs now

With a full suite of tools built from the ground up for speed and fidelity, Power PDF allows users to take full advantage of the format’s best features. From speeding up tedious tasks like transferring tables into excel to paving the way to improved document workflows and security, all these advantages don’t come with a steep price tag. For one perpetual licensing fee, you can acquire all these tools for a lifetime of reliability.

Try the full range of features and see how easy document conversion is when you explore a free trial version of Power PDF for 15 days.