How to Combine PDFs on Mac: Preview, Finder or Online

Quick Answer

Every Mac can join PDFs without extra software, and the one thing to know before you start is that Preview changes the file as you work. Apple's guide says that changes you make to a Preview document are saved automatically, and tells you to choose File > Duplicate on each PDF first if you want to keep the originals next to the new combined one.

We read Apple's guides and each tool's own pages, and we did not run the steps ourselves, so every menu name below is Apple's. Apple's guides show no date; their version menus run up to macOS 27 Golden Gate, so they cover that release and earlier.

Join in Preview

Preview is the app that opens PDFs on a Mac. Apple's guide to combining PDFs in Preview says you can add individual pages from one PDF to another, or merge the entire contents of two or more PDFs.

1. Make copies first. Apple's warning comes before its steps: choose File > Duplicate on each PDF, because Preview saves every change to the file you are working in.
2. Open the PDFs you want to combine in the Preview app.
3. In each open PDF, choose View > Thumbnails to show the page thumbnails in the sidebar.
4. Drag the thumbnails you want from the sidebar of one PDF to the sidebar of the other. If they are not next to one another, Command-click each one to select it.
5. Drop them at the end of the document or between two pages.

To add a whole PDF, Apple's tip is to drag the PDF icon from the Finder into the sidebar of an open document. There is a menu route too. On Apple's page about adding, deleting or moving pages, select the page that should come before the new pages, choose Edit > Insert, then Page from File. The new pages go in after the page you selected. The same page says the Add button at the bottom of the thumbnails sidebar offers Insert from File.

Apple's combine page has no Save step, because of the autosave. That is why step 1 comes first: once you drop pages in, the file you dropped them into is already changed.

Join in Finder

Apple's guide to combining files into a PDF works from the desktop or a Finder window and needs no app to be open.

1. Select the files you want to combine. Apple says they appear in the PDF in the same order that you select them.
2. Control-click the selected files, then choose Quick Actions > Create PDF.
3. The new file is created with a name similar to the first file you selected.

Apple adds a second way. Select the files in the Finder and use the Create PDF button at the bottom of the Preview pane of a Finder window. If the pane is hidden, choose View > Show Preview in the menu bar.

One gap in Apple's page: it says "files" and never says whether PDFs are among them. We did not run the Quick Action, so we cannot tell you it joins two PDFs. Try it on copies first. If it does not do what you want, the Preview route above is the one Apple's guide describes for PDFs.

Reorder Pages

Sorting out the order is the same drag, done inside one PDF. On Apple's page about moving pages, choose View > Thumbnails or View > Contact Sheet, then drag the pages to their new place.

To remove a page, select it in the sidebar and press the Delete key. Apple warns that this also removes every annotation on that page.

Pull Pages Out

Taking a few pages out of a PDF is the reverse job, and Apple's pages describe no Extract command for it. Apple's page about moving pages has one sentence on it: you can create a new PDF by dragging thumbnails from a PDF sidebar to the desktop.

1. Open the PDF in Preview and choose View > Thumbnails.
2. Select the pages. Click one thumbnail, and Command-click the others if they are not next to one another.
3. Drag them to the desktop. Apple says this creates a new PDF.

A second route goes through printing. Apple's print page says to Command-click the thumbnails of the pages you want, choose File > Print, and select Selection in Preview to print only the selected thumbnails. Apple's page on saving a PDF then says to choose File > Print, open the PDF pop-up menu and choose Save as PDF. Apple does not join the two pages into one set of steps, so this is our reading of them. Adobe's guide to saving one page of a PDF, an Internet Archive copy of 13 April 2026, describes a Pages setting in the Print dialog; Apple's pages do not mention one.

A third route is to delete the pages you do not want, on a duplicate, as in Reorder Pages above.

We did not run any of the three. Apple does not say whether the original PDF changes when you drag pages out, or whether bookmarks and links survive in the new file, so try it on a copy first.

To pull pages out online, these vendors state the following. The Online Tools section below covers what an upload means.

• Adobe Acrobat online. Adobe's Extract PDF pages tool takes one PDF of up to 500 pages and 100 MB, and asks you to sign in after the upload. It says the original PDF stays intact. This is the Internet Archive copy of 25 October 2026.
• Smallpdf. Smallpdf's extract page says you can use the tool for free, "although usage limits may apply", with no number given. It says files are deleted after one hour unless you save them to your account.
• PDF24. PDF24's extract page says it is free, lists "No limits" and "No registration required", and is paid for by advertising. It says files are deleted from its servers after one hour, and that its servers are in Germany.
• iLovePDF. The Split PDF page has an Extract mode with a "Pages to extract" field. The archived plan table of 24 October 2026 gives Split PDF 100 MB per task on Basic and 4 GB on Premium.

Online Tools

Online tools suit a pile of files or a job where you want a drag-and-drop screen. Your files are uploaded to the vendor, so for private documents stay with Preview.

• Adobe Acrobat online. Adobe's Merge PDF page says the tool creates a merged PDF of up to 1,500 pages and combines up to 100 files, with each file limited to 500 pages. It says files are deleted permanently unless you sign in and save them, and that organizing single pages after the merge needs a sign-in. Adobe's site blocked a plain read, so this is the Internet Archive copy of 2 November 2026.
• iLovePDF. The plan comparison on iLovePDF's pricing page lists 25 files per batch and 100 MB per task on the Basic plan, and 500 files and 4 GB on Premium. That is an archived US copy of 24 October 2026. We could not read how long iLovePDF keeps merged files.
• Smallpdf. Smallpdf's merge page offers the merge for free, lets you rearrange or delete pages before you finish, and says uploaded files are deleted from its servers after one hour. The page states no file count or size limit. We could not confirm Smallpdf's US price, so we leave it out.
• Dropbox. Dropbox's article on combining PDFs on a Mac calls its PDF editor a free, browser-based tool that merges PDFs. The article gives no limit and no price.

File Size

A combined PDF can be too big to attach. Preview's Reduce File Size filter handles that, and our post on how to compress a PDF covers the steps and what it costs in quality. For the attaching itself, see how to send a PDF by email.

Send the Result

Loop does not merge, reorder or edit PDFs, so do the combining with Preview or one of the tools above. When the pack is ready, Loop is a Mac app that turns it into your own link, and it suits you when the pack goes to a client and you want to see what happens next. For a PDF sent once to one person it adds nothing: attach it.

1. Drop the merged PDF onto the Loop icon in the menu bar, or choose File > New Link.
2. Link Copied. The link is on your clipboard.
3. Paste it into your message. You write and send the email yourself.

• One address for the pack. The reader opens the PDF in their browser, with no app and no account.
• A password, an expiry, no downloads. Password, Expires (optional, Never by default) and Allow Downloads are settings on each link. Turn Allow Downloads off and the reader can only read the PDF in the browser.
• Signatures. You can place up to 12 Sign Here spots, so a proposal with the signature on page 6 is one step for the signer. The signer types their full name.
• Reading stats. Loop shows an average time across readers and the furthest page reached, such as "Read 3 of 8 Pages". That is the furthest page, not the pages read.
• Replace File. If a page changes, swap the merged PDF behind the link. The address stays the same, and earlier copies are kept and can be restored.

Prefer not to merge at all? Drop the PDFs on Loop together, and they come back as one link. The reader sees a page that lists each file by name and size, with a Download All button (shown only while Allow Downloads is on), and each file is tracked on its own. The trade-off is that Replace File is not available on that kind of link, so merge first if you expect to update the pack. We did not check whether signing works on the PDFs inside such a link, so do not count on it.

A Loop link opens the whole PDF. To share a few pages of a long file, pull them out first as above, then link the new file.

Your Mac shows a notification the first time each visitor opens a link. That is once per reader's browser per link, and only while Loop is running.

Limits

Loop is not a PDF editor. Here is what it does not do:

• It does not merge, reorder or edit PDFs. We searched the app for any way to join two PDFs or move pages and found none. The one place it joins pages is when it turns a spreadsheet's sheets into a single PDF.
• It does not extract, split or hide pages. We searched the app for any way to pick pages out of a PDF and found none, and the reader sees every page of the file you link.
• It does not encrypt the PDF. The password guards the link page. If you allow downloads, the reader gets the original PDF.
• It does not preview a PDF that needs a password to open. This is from the code; we did not run it. Merge first, then protect the link instead.
• It does not send the email. It copies the link and you paste it.
• It does not work from an iPhone or Windows. The sender needs a Mac running macOS 14 or later. Readers can use a web browser.
• It does not alert you by email or phone. Alerts are Mac notifications while Loop is running.
• It needs a Cloudflare account. Setup signs in to Cloudflare once.

We do not promise a maximum file size.

Cost

Preview and the Finder Quick Action come with the Mac. The online merges are free to use, and iLovePDF's paid plan is for larger batches. Loop is $49 once for one person, and it does not do the merging.

These are US dollars for one person, and we could not confirm whether tax is included. iLovePDF's free Basic plan merges 25 files per batch; the $60 buys Premium and is the dollar figure on its archived page (yearly billing). Paid month by month it is $9 a month, which is $108 over a year. Loop's row is the cost of sending the finished pack, not of merging.

A merged pack sent through Loop sits in your own Cloudflare account, which holds the first 10 GB free. Beyond that Cloudflare charges you directly: its pricing page, updated 30 October 2026, shows $0.015 per GB-month and nothing extra when people download. Expect Cloudflare to ask for a card at the point you turn storage on.

If you want to try sending a finished pack, the first 14 days are free from the moment you first open Loop, with no payment up front. While the trial runs, your clients see a small "Shared with Loop" badge on the page, which a licence takes away.