Convert an RTF File to PDF
Converting RTF to PDF renders a Rich Text Format document — styled text stored as plain-text control words — through a word processor's layout engine and freezes the result as fixed PDF pages, so fonts, bold and italic runs, tables and embedded images stop depending on which application opens the file. This page covers the reliable local methods: Microsoft Word, free LibreOffice Writer (including a batch command line), and macOS TextEdit.
RTF looks simple but requires a full word-processor layout engine to interpret hundreds of control words, resolve font substitutions, and paginate tables — machinery browsers do not expose to a web page. Rather than ship a converter that mangles anything beyond plain paragraphs, this guide shows the methods that get it right.
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How to convert RTF to PDF (step by step)
Method 1 — Microsoft Word
- Open the .rtf file — double-click it, or in Word use File → Open. Word reads RTF natively; no import dialog appears.
- Skim the document for font substitutions or shifted images before exporting, since the PDF freezes whatever Word displays.
- Go to File → Save As, set the file type to PDF, and pick Standard quality for sharing or Minimum size for email.
- Choose a name and location and click Save. Word writes a paginated PDF with the document's fonts embedded.
Method 2 — LibreOffice Writer (free, plus batch mode)
Open the .rtf in LibreOffice Writer and use File → Export As → Export as PDF… → Export. For many files at once, use the headless converter from a terminal:
soffice --headless --convert-to pdf --outdir ./pdfs *.rtfThis converts every RTF in the folder without opening a window — one PDF per input file. It is the standard approach for clearing out an archive of old RTF correspondence. Close any running LibreOffice window first, or the command exits silently.
Method 3 — macOS TextEdit (no installs at all)
TextEdit is the Mac's built-in RTF editor. Open the file, choose File → Print… (⌘P), then click the PDF button in the lower-left of the print dialog and pick Save as PDF. This routes the document through macOS's Quartz PDF engine — fine for letters and simple documents, though TextEdit's rendering of complex tables is weaker than Word's or Writer's.
How it works
An RTF file is ASCII text you can open in any editor: it starts with {\rtf1 and marks up the content with backslash control words — \b for bold, \fs24 for 12 pt text (the unit is half-points), \par for a paragraph break — with braces grouping the scopes. A font table at the top maps numbers to font names only; the actual font files are never included. Images are embedded inline as hexadecimal dumps of PNG, JPEG or WMF data, which is why an RTF with pictures is often several times larger than the equivalent .docx.
Conversion to PDF is therefore a two-stage process. First the word processor parses the control words into its internal document model and runs layout: choosing real installed fonts for the named ones, measuring text, breaking lines, and paginating — RTF itself records no page breaks, so pagination is computed fresh on every machine. Second, the PDF exporter serializes each laid-out page into a content stream of positioned glyph runs and image XObjects, embedding subsets of the fonts actually used.
The two failure points follow directly from that design. Missing fonts get substituted before layout, so line and page breaks move — the document reflows rather than breaking. And because the RTF specification grew for two decades, Word and LibreOffice implement overlapping but not identical subsets; exotic constructs like nested tables or drawing objects are where their outputs diverge. Converting with the same application family that produced the RTF gives the closest match to the original author's view.
Worked example: a 12-page contract with two images
Test file: service-agreement.rtf, 4.6 MB — large because its two scanned signature images are stored as hex text, which doubles their byte size. The document is 12 pages in Times New Roman 11 pt with one summary table.
Word 365's Save As PDF produced a 348 KB PDF in about two seconds: the hex-encoded images went back to binary JPEG, the text became compressed content streams, and a Times New Roman subset was embedded. LibreOffice 24.8 headless produced 341 KB with identical page breaks on pages 1–11; page 12 broke one line earlier because Writer spaced the table rows 2 pt tighter. TextEdit's print-to-PDF gave 1.1 MB — Quartz stored the images losslessly — and rendered the table with uneven column widths. For this file, either Word or LibreOffice was the right choice; the 13× size drop from source RTF to PDF is typical for image-bearing RTFs.
Frequently asked questions
What is an RTF file and why do I still see them?
Rich Text Format is a 1987 Microsoft interchange format that stores styled text as plain-text control words readable by almost every word processor. It persists because legal, medical and government systems adopted it as a safe exchange format that cannot carry macros.
Can I convert RTF to PDF without Microsoft Word?
Yes. LibreOffice Writer opens RTF and exports PDF on Windows, macOS and Linux for free, macOS TextEdit can print any RTF straight to PDF, and Google Docs can import one and download it as PDF.
Why does my converted RTF look different from the original?
RTF stores font names but not the fonts themselves, so a machine without those fonts substitutes others with different widths, which moves line and page breaks. The application doing the conversion also matters, because Word and LibreOffice interpret some spacing and table control words differently.
How do I convert many RTF files to PDF in one go?
Use LibreOffice headless from a terminal: soffice --headless --convert-to pdf *.rtf converts every RTF in the folder, one PDF per file. No window opens and no clicking is needed.
Do images inside an RTF survive the conversion to PDF?
Yes. Images are embedded in the RTF itself as hex-encoded PNG, JPEG or WMF data, so any converter that renders the file places them in the PDF at their stored position and size.
Is RTF to PDF conversion safe for confidential documents?
Converting locally with Word, LibreOffice or TextEdit keeps the file on your machine, which is the safe route for confidential material. Avoid uploading sensitive RTFs to online converters, since you cannot verify what happens to the copy on their server.