Add custom text to the top or bottom of every page — a title, company name, date, or page number. Everything happens in your browser. Free.
🔒 The PDF is edited entirely in your browser — nothing is uploaded.
A header or footer turns a plain document into something that looks finished and stays identifiable once it's printed, forwarded, or pulled out of a folder — a document title, a client name, a confidentiality notice, or a revision date, repeated on every page. It's the same finishing touch word processors add automatically, applied directly to an existing PDF without needing the original source file.
Need this after merging several files together? Run PDF Merger first, then add your header/footer here. For numbering only, without custom text, our Add Page Numbers tool is simpler.
It draws your chosen text permanently onto the top and/or bottom margin of every page in a PDF — up to six independent pieces of text (header-left, header-centre, header-right, footer-left, footer-centre, footer-right), each optional. Unlike a live header in a word processor, this becomes part of the page content itself once saved.
This is different from our Add Page Numbers tool, which only ever stamps a number in one spot. Here you can put a document title on the left, "Page {page} of {total}" on the right, and a confidentiality notice along the bottom, all at once.
| Use case | Example setup |
|---|---|
| Business report | Header-left: company name · Footer-right: Page {page} of {total} |
| Legal draft | Footer-centre: "CONFIDENTIAL DRAFT" · Header-right: {date} |
| Assignment submission | Header-left: your name · Footer-right: {page} of {total} |
| Contract or agreement | Footer-left: document reference number · Footer-right: {page} of {total} |
Is my PDF uploaded to a server?
No — the header and footer text is drawn onto the pages entirely inside your browser using pdf-lib, and the file never leaves your device.
What's the difference between this and your Add Page Numbers tool?
Add Page Numbers only stamps a number in one chosen spot. This tool lets you put any custom text — a document title, company name, confidentiality notice, date, or page number — independently in up to six positions (left/centre/right, top and bottom) at once.
Can I include the page number and date automatically?
Yes — use {page} for the current page number, {total} for the total page count, and {date} for today's date anywhere in your header or footer text, and they'll be filled in automatically on every page.
Will the header or footer overlap my content?
It's placed in the page margin, close to the edge. If a document already uses very tight margins, preview the result and reduce the font size if needed.
Does this work on a PDF that already has headers or footers?
It adds new text on top of the existing page content — it doesn't detect or remove any existing header or footer text that's already part of the page.
Can I apply a header to only some pages?
Currently it applies to every page of the file uniformly. For a document that needs different treatment in different sections (like a cover page with no header), split it first with Delete/Extract Pages, process the sections separately, then merge them back together.
Does it work on any PDF?
Any standard, unencrypted PDF. Password-protected files need their protection removed first in your PDF viewer.