Free online PDF to WMV converter

Some legacy Windows players and editing workflows accept WMV but not PDF, so a PDF may need to become a timed video slideshow. Each page becomes a still frame; the conversion does not turn PDF text into editable video elements.

What the PDF format is

PDF preserves a document’s page layout, fonts, and graphics across devices. It is commonly created with office software, design tools, or by scanning paper, and is opened with programs such as Adobe Acrobat Reader and web browsers.

What the WMV format is

WMV is Microsoft’s Windows Media Video format, commonly stored in an ASF container. It suits older Windows playback and editing systems that specifically require WMV; it can also carry audio, though a video made from PDF pages has no audio unless a soundtrack is added separately.

How to convert PDF to WMV

Online on 101convert.com

1. Upload the PDF on the converter page. Several files can be added for batch conversion; the page shows the per-file size limit.
2. Set show each page for to choose how long each page appears.
3. Start the conversion and download the WMV file when it is ready.

Offline with desktop software

On Windows, macOS, or Linux, Poppler’s pdftoppm and FFmpeg provide a free command-line workflow. Render the pages as numbered PNG files, then encode the sequence as WMV:

1. Run pdftoppm -png -r 150 input.pdf page. This creates files such as page-1.png and page-2.png.
2. Run ffmpeg -framerate 1/5 -i page-%d.png -vf "scale=1280:720:force_original_aspect_ratio=decrease,pad=1280:720:(ow-iw)/2:(oh-ih)/2,format=yuv420p" -c:v wmv2 -an output.wmv. The input rate makes each page display for five seconds; change 1/5 to adjust the timing. The filter fits pages into a 1280 × 720 frame without stretching them.

For a graphical commercial workflow, Adobe Acrobat Pro can export PDF pages as images; insert those images as slides in PowerPoint 2010, set slide timings, then use File → Save & Send → Create a Video and save as WMV. PowerPoint versions after 2010 generally export video as MP4 rather than WMV.

Quality and limitations

Rendering at 150 dpi sets the page-image detail; increase it for small text, at the cost of larger intermediate images. The resulting WMV is a sequence of page images, so searchable text, links, and PDF structure are lost. Check that the target player supports the WMV video codec used by the encoder.