Add a Watermark to a PDF

Settings explained

Each setting changes one thing, so you can get the look you want without trial and error:

• Layout: Diagonal runs corner to corner and is the classic choice for DRAFT and CONFIDENTIAL. Horizontal sits straight across the middle and reads more like a label.
• Size: Small, Medium, or Large. If your text is long, it shrinks automatically so it never runs off the page.
• Strength: Light is barely there and suits documents people need to read closely. Strong is hard to ignore and survives photocopying.
• Colour: Grey is neutral. Red signals a warning, which suits CONFIDENTIAL. Blue and black suit company names.

Which word should you use?

A watermark works best when it tells the reader one thing at a glance:

• DRAFT: the content may still change. Use it on reports, contracts, and proposals sent for review, so nobody forwards an unfinished version as final.
• CONFIDENTIAL: the reader should not share it further. Common on salary letters, board papers, and legal documents.
• SAMPLE or SPECIMEN: shows what a certificate, invoice, or form looks like without it being usable as the real thing.
• COPY: marks a duplicate of a document whose original matters, such as an ID or certificate submitted for verification.
• A recipient and date, such as FOR ACME LTD 21-10: shows who a copy was issued to and discourages passing it on.

Watermarking only some pages

Switch Apply to Selected pages and type the pages you want, separated by commas: 1 for the first page, 2-5 for a range, or 10- for page 10 to the end. This is useful when only part of a document is sensitive, such as the pricing pages of a proposal or the annexures of an agreement.

If you are unsure how many pages the file has, the tool will tell you when a page number does not exist.

Languages and characters

Watermarks support English letters, numbers, and common punctuation. Text in other scripts, such as Hindi, Arabic, or Chinese, and emoji cannot be drawn yet, and you will see a message asking you to change the text. Use the English word, such as CONFIDENTIAL, in the meantime.

How secure is a watermark?

A watermark is a visible label, not a lock. It becomes part of the page, so it survives printing, screenshots, and forwarding, which is what makes it a good deterrent. Someone with PDF editing software and some effort can still remove it.

For documents that must stay private, add a password with Protect PDF after watermarking, so the file cannot be opened without it. Always watermark first: a protected file has to be unlocked before it can be changed.

The watermark word also becomes part of the document text, so it will appear in search results inside the PDF and in totals from the PDF Word Counter.

A tidy order for review packs

When sending a set of documents for review, merge them into one file, add page numbers so reviewers can refer to pages, add a DRAFT watermark, and finally protect the file with a password. In that order, nothing needs to be unlocked or redone.