Create a PDF/A when a court, archive or university demands one

getPDF does not convert to PDF/A, and it does not validate PDF/A. What it can do, on your device, is show you the things PDF/A forbids before you submit: fonts that are not embedded, encryption, scripts, attached files. More on that below.

What is PDF/A, and why do institutions demand it?

PDF/A is ISO 19005, a family of standards for PDFs meant for long-term keeping. Courts, national archives, universities (for theses) and tax and e-invoicing systems ask for it because an archive cannot rely on the fonts or software someone happens to have in 2050.

The rules, as the Library of Congress summarises them for parts 1 to 3 (Sustainability of Digital Formats, checked on 11 October 2026):

• All fonts must be embedded. No relying on the reader’s computer.
• Encryption is not allowed. No password to open, no restrictions.
• No JavaScript and no launch actions. Nothing runs.
• No audio or video.
• Device-independent colour and standard metadata (XMP), which is also where the file declares itself PDF/A.

The parts: PDF/A-1 (2005, based on PDF 1.4), PDF/A-2 (2011, based on PDF 1.7, adds transparency and layers), PDF/A-3 (2012, like 2 but may carry attached files of any kind, which is how e-invoices such as ZUGFeRD travel), and PDF/A-4 (2020, based on PDF 2.0). The letter after the number is the conformance level: b (basic) means it looks right; a (accessible) also requires a tagged, structured document; u adds reliable Unicode text.

From Word: File, Export, Options

On Windows:

1. Finish the document. Accept or reject all tracked changes and delete comments.
2. File, Export, Create PDF/XPS.
3. Click Options in the save dialog.
4. Tick ISO 19005-1 compliant (PDF/A). Leave Document structure tags for accessibility ticked too.
5. OK, then Publish.

Microsoft names the option “ISO 19005-1 compliant (PDF/A)” (Microsoft Support, “Save or convert to PDF or XPS in Office desktop apps”, checked on 11 October 2026). ISO 19005-1 is part 1, so this is a PDF/A-1 file. If the institution asks for PDF/A-2 or 3 by name, use LibreOffice.

From LibreOffice: Export as PDF

LibreOffice is free, and its export offers more PDF/A versions:

1. Open the document in Writer (it opens .docx files too; check the layout after it does).
2. File, Export As, Export as PDF.
3. On the General tab, pick the PDF/A version. Since LibreOffice 25.8 (August 2025) the PDF/A versions sit in the PDF Version list, including PDF/A-4. Older versions have a checkbox, Archive (PDF/A, ISO 19005), with its own list of PDF/A-1b, PDF/A-2b and PDF/A-3b.
4. Export and name the file.

LibreOffice’s own help (version 24.2) recommends PDF/A-2b for most users and describes PDF/A-3b as identical to 2b but able to carry other files.

Google Docs has no PDF/A export. Download the document as .docx (File, Download, Microsoft Word) and export it from LibreOffice or Word.

Which version does the institution mean?

Read the requirement word for word. A court rule or a thesis guideline usually names the part and level (“PDF/A-1b”, “PDF/A-2 or later”). If it says only “PDF/A”, ask; if nobody answers, PDF/A-2b is what LibreOffice recommends for most uses. Do not pick PDF/A-3 unless attachments are the point, and do not pick a level a unless the document is properly structured with headings and tags, because it is the strictest to pass.

Check it passes before you submit

Word and LibreOffice write a file that declares itself PDF/A; whether it truly conforms is a separate question. The free validator of record is veraPDF, an open-source PDF/A validator backed by the PDF software community (verapdf.org, checked on 11 October 2026). Run it on your file and read the report: it names the rule, the clause and the object that fails.

Before that, or when you cannot install anything, Inspect shows the commonest failures on your device:

1. Drop the PDF into Inspect above.
2. Fonts: every font must say embedded. A font marked not embedded fails PDF/A.
3. Security: Encrypted must say no.
4. Scripts and Launch actions: both must say none.
5. Attachments: none, unless it is PDF/A-3.
6. XMP metadata: should be present, with the creator tool and producer you expect, and PDF/A part and PDF/A level showing what the file declares (2 and B for a PDF/A-2b).

Those last 2 lines are the file’s claim about itself, not a check: a file can say PDF/A-2b and break every rule. Inspect does not look at colour profiles or any of the other rules. A clean Inspect report is a good sign, not a pass.

Do not break it afterwards

Any change to a PDF/A file can void it, and many tools do not tell you. We ran getPDF’s tools on a 3-page file that declares PDF/A-2b (11 October 2026) and looked at what came out:

Tool	The PDF/A declaration after	What the result says
Merge, Split, Extract pages, Organise	Gone: a new, ordinary PDF	Warns that the new file is not PDF/A, and to make the PDF/A from the finished document
Protect	File encrypted, which PDF/A forbids	Warns that the protected copy is not PDF/A; keep the original for the archive
Add page numbers, Watermark	Kept, but the added text uses a font that is not embedded	Warns that the result no longer meets PDF/A, though it still says it does
Remove metadata, Resize, N-up	Gone	Nothing: these remove or rebuild the XMP packet that declares PDF/A
Rotate, Delete pages, Crop, Compress, Grayscale, Flatten, the editor’s save	Kept	Nothing; the file is not re-validated, so check again

So: number the pages, merge the appendices and fix the typos in Word or Writer, where the document is still a document, and export to PDF/A at the end. If the appendices only exist as PDFs, you need a PDF/A converter: Acrobat Pro has one, and online services such as PDF24 and iLovePDF list PDF/A tools (see our PDF24 comparison); those online tools work by uploading the file. getPDF has no converter.

What getPDF cannot do here

The honest part:

• It does not convert a PDF to PDF/A. That needs fonts embedded after the fact, colour profiles added and forbidden features removed; it is on the long-term list, not live.
• It does not validate PDF/A. Inspect shows what it shows; veraPDF decides.
• Most of its tools leave a file that is no longer PDF/A, as the table shows, and only some of them say so. Run them before the export, never after.

For the e-invoice side of PDF/A-3, see e-invoices and business PDFs. For a PDF that will not open at all, fix a broken PDF is the place to start.