How to add page numbers to a PDF
Straightforward in principle, fiddly in practice — because the interesting cases are the ones a cover page, a second volume, or a mixed batch throw up.
Updated 2026-10-08 · no upload, works offline once loaded
Numbering a document looks trivial until the first real document. A cover page should not be numbered. A second volume should not restart at one. And "Page 3 of 12" is not interchangeable with "3". This is what to decide before you start.
Decide three things first
- Which number to start from. A first document starts at 1. A document that follows a 40-page first volume starts at 41.
- Whether to skip the opening pages. A cover or title page conventionally carries no number.
- What the label should say. Bare numbers suit most documents; "Page 3 of 40" suits anything people will print and refer to aloud.
Getting these straight beforehand saves redoing the whole document, which matters most on a long file.
Numbering the document
- Drop in the PDF.
- Choose a position. Bottom centre is the convention for reports and academic documents; bottom right suits business correspondence.
- Choose a format and the number to start from.
- Click add page numbers. The numbered copy downloads.
Handling a cover page
Set Skip first N pages to 1. The first page is left untouched and numbering begins on page two — but it still starts from the value you chose. So you can have an unnumbered cover followed by a page labelled 1, or followed by a page labelled 2 because the cover counted. Both conventions exist; pick the one your reader expects.
Continuing across volumes
If the first volume ends at page 40, set the second volume to start at 41. Nothing links the two files, but anyone holding both sees continuous numbering, which is usually the point.
Are the numbers real text?
Yes. They are drawn with an embedded font, which means they can be selected, copied and searched. A numbering tool that rasterises the page instead would give you numbers that look the same and behave worse — unselectable, unsearchable, and slightly blurred.
Scanned documents
Numbering works the same way. The numbers are drawn as a new layer on top of the existing page image, so it makes no difference whether the page underneath contains any text at all.
If the result looks wrong
The most common problem is numbering everything when only some pages were rotated or malformed. There is no per-page control here — the tool applies one scheme to the whole document. If a document genuinely needs two different schemes, number it in two passes and combine the results.