Watermark PDF

• Mark drafts so nobody mistakes a work in progress for the final version.
• Label confidential documents as a clear reminder not to forward or print them.
• Protect samples and proofs such as design mock-ups, quotes or photos sent for approval.
• Trace copies by stamping the recipient’s name, like “Copy for Acme Ltd”, so you know where a document came from if it turns up elsewhere.
• Void old documents by stamping VOID or SUPERSEDED across them.

A watermark should be noticeable without making the page hard to read. An opacity of 20–30% usually gets the balance right. Gray is subtle and professional; red stands out for warnings like DRAFT or VOID. The color picker lets you match your brand color exactly.

Diagonal watermarks run from corner to corner, follow the shape of each page, and are harder to crop out of a screenshot. Straight watermarks run across the middle and look neater on forms and letters. Shorter words can be bigger, so keep the text brief: one to three words works best.

For a logo watermark, a PNG with a transparent background blends in best, because only the logo itself is stamped, not a white box around it. Around 40–60% is a good starting size; it’s measured against the page’s shorter side, so the logo fits landscape pages too.

Short, specific text works best. Some wording people commonly use:

• CONFIDENTIAL or INTERNAL USE ONLY for business documents.
• DRAFT, or DRAFT v2 to show which revision someone is reading.
• SAMPLE or PROOF for designs, quotes and creative work sent for approval.
• COPY or COPY FOR J. SMITH to mark duplicates and trace who received them.
• PAID, VOID or SUPERSEDED for invoices and old versions.

Watermark text can be up to 60 characters, but anything over about 20 characters gets small on the page, so keep the most important word first.

It’s worth being clear about what a watermark can and can’t do. It discourages casual copying and makes a document’s status obvious, but someone with PDF editing software can often remove or cover a watermark. For documents that truly must not leak, limit who receives them, and consider stamping each copy with the recipient’s name so any leak can be traced.

Watermarks use a standard Latin font, so letters, numbers and common symbols work, but scripts such as Chinese, Arabic or Cyrillic aren’t supported yet; you’ll see a message if your text can’t be used. Watermarks are applied to every page. To watermark only part of a document, extract those pages with Extract PDF Pages first.

Your PDF is processed entirely in your browser, and the watermark is added without changing anything else in the file, so links, bookmarks and form fields are preserved. Want numbers on your pages too? Try Add Page Numbers.