How to Merge PDF Files on Android

Android has no system-level PDF merge either, and the free apps that offer it tend to want storage permissions far beyond what the job requires. Chrome can do it without installing anything.

Merging in Chrome

1. 1Open the Merge PDF tool in Chrome.
2. 2Tap the upload area — the Android file picker opens with Downloads, Drive and your other storage providers.
3. 3Select your PDFs. Long-press to multi-select if they are in the same folder.
4. 4Order them, then tap Merge.
5. 5The result goes to your Downloads folder and appears in the notification shade.

Getting files out of Google Drive

The picker shows Drive, but on some devices it hands the browser a link rather than the file. If a Drive file will not load, download it to the device first, then pick it from Downloads. It is one extra tap and it works every time.

Why no app is a feature, not a compromise

A PDF merge app needs read access to your storage, which in practice means access to every document and often every photo on the phone. A web page gets exactly the files you hand it through the picker and nothing else. The browser sandbox is doing real work here.

Practical limits on a phone

Chrome on Android will reload a tab that uses too much memory, so very large jobs can restart mid-merge. If you are combining large colour scans, do it in two or three smaller merges and then merge the results — or use a computer.

Merging photos into a PDF

Photos need converting first. JPG to PDF takes several images and produces one document, which you can then merge with anything else. If you are photographing paper, the scan mode in Google Drive crops and squares the page before saving, which produces a far more usable result than the plain camera.