What is PDF/A?
PDF/A is an ISO-standardized version of PDF specialized for long-term preservation of electronic documents.
Self-contained: All fonts, images, and content embedded
Device independent: Appears identical across all systems
No external dependencies: No links to web resources
Common Use Cases
Legal & Compliance
Court filings, regulatory submissions, contracts
Government & Academia
Public records, research papers, institutional archives
Corporate Archives
Financial records, policy documents, long-term storage
Technical Requirements & Best Practices
System Requirements
- • Ghostscript provides most reliable results
- • sRGB ICC profile recommended for color accuracy
- • All fonts must be embeddable
- • No encrypted or password-protected content
Conversion Tips
- • PDF/A-1b recommended for maximum compatibility
- • Use PDF/A-2b only if you need advanced features
- • Test archival PDFs before final deployment
- • Validate with PDF/A verification tools
Important Limitations
• No external content: Links to websites, external files, or multimedia are removed
• Font embedding: All fonts must be legally embeddable (some proprietary fonts may cause issues)
• Color profiles: Colors may shift slightly during ICC profile conversion
• File size: PDF/A files are typically larger due to embedded resources
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