PDFtk — The Complete Guide: Merge, Split, Stamp and Fill Forms from the Command Line
PDFtk from PDF Labs comes in two free parts: PDFtk Free, a simple Windows GUI for merging and splitting, and PDFtk Server, an open-source command-line tool for Windows, macOS and Linux. The real power is on the command line: one command in a script assembles a full set of drawings.
PDFtk
PDF Labs
Classic PDF toolkit: merge, split, rotate, stamp and fill forms from the command line, plus a simple free Windows GUI.
Get it from the vendorWhat you get
- Merge and split — combining files and bursting a PDF into single pages.
- Rotation and page selection — building a new file from page ranges.
- Stamps and watermarks — overlaying a PDF page on a document.
- Forms — filling fields from FDF or XFDF data.
- Encryption, attachments and repair — including attempts to recover damaged files.
Usage examples
Merge: pdftk a.pdf b.pdf cat output set.pdf. Burst into pages: pdftk set.pdf burst. Stamp every page: pdftk set.pdf stamp stamp.pdf output stamped.pdf. PDFtk Server is licensed under GPL version 2 and is free for internal business use too; shipping it inside closed-source software needs a commercial licence, and the graphical PDFtk Pro is paid.
Related tools
For structural transformations and file repair — qpdf. For merging and splitting in a GUI — PDFsam Basic. For compression and conversion — Ghostscript.
qpdf
qpdf project (Jay Berkenbilt)
Command-line tool to repair, encrypt and decrypt, merge and split PDFs and inspect file structure — without changing the content.
Get it from the vendor
PDFsam Basic
Sober Lemur
Split, merge, rotate and extract PDF pages — for drawing sets, specifications and submissions.
Get it from the vendor
Ghostscript
Artifex Software
The engine behind many PDF tools: compress, convert to PDF/A, rasterise and repair PDFs from the command line.
Get it from the vendor
PDF Arranger
PDF Arranger project
Merge, split, rotate, crop and reorder PDF pages by drag and drop — for assembling calc packages, submittals and drawing sets.
Get it from the vendorThe bottom line
PDFtk is a long-standing, reliable tool for automating document production. If you prefer a mouse, use the free GUI or PDFsam.