Online .pub converters: what to check before you upload
Search for "convert pub to pdf" and you get a page of converters that all look much the same. A box to drop a file in, a button, a promise. They are not the same, though, and the differences show up after you've uploaded something you care about.
You can't see inside any of these services, and most of them don't say how they read a .pub file. So don't try to judge the engine. Judge the things a vendor does tell you. There are four, and each one takes a minute to find on the vendor's own page.
1. How big a file can you send for free?
Publisher files get large fast. A newsletter with a dozen phone photos can pass 50 MB without anyone noticing. A free limit that's smaller than your file means you find out about the paid plan halfway through the job.
The numbers vary a lot. As of October 2026, Zamzar's PUB to PDF page lists a free maximum of 3 MB. FreeConvert's PUB to PDF page lists 1 GB, and its free plan also counts conversion minutes per day. Other services don't put a free limit on their .pub page at all, which is worth noting by itself.
Our answer: the free preview takes files up to 25 MB and 100 pages. A paid job takes up to 20 files and 2 GB.
2. How long do they keep your file?
Church rotas, school newsletters and club directories have names, phone numbers and addresses in them. Before you upload, find the sentence that says when the file is deleted. Every reputable service has one.
As of October 2026, here's what three vendors say. Zamzar says it keeps free users' files for a maximum of 24 hours. FreeConvert says files are automatically deleted after 8 hours. Aspose says it deletes uploaded documents after 24 hours.
Our answer: your upload is deleted when the conversion or download finishes. Jobs that someone abandons are removed within one hour. We don't keep copies.
3. Can you see the result before you pay?
This matters more for .pub files than for most formats. A Word document converts in a fairly predictable way. A Publisher layout doesn't. Text boxes, WordArt, linked frames, booklet page order and print sheets of business cards all have to land in the right place, and a converter can get every word right and still give you a page that looks nothing like the original.
So look for a way to judge the result on your own file, not on the vendor's sample. Some services let you convert a few small files free, which works if your files are small. Others ask you to pay or sign up first.
Our answer: drop a .pub and you see every converted page as a watermarked image, free and with no account, up to 100 pages and 25 MB. We wrote about why we work this way in see your file before you pay. If the preview looks wrong, don't buy.
4. What can you get out of it?
PDF is what most people need. It keeps the look and it opens everywhere. But if someone has to change next year's newsletter, a PDF leaves them retyping it.
Check the list of output formats on the vendor's .pub page, not the general home page. As of October 2026, CloudConvert's PUB page lists PDF and image formats (BMP, JPG, PNG). Zamzar and FreeConvert both have PUB to PDF pages. If you need an editable file, look for Word, and ask whether the result is real text or a picture of each page pasted into a document. We explain the difference in Publisher to Word, without the picture-of-a-page trick.
Our answer: PDF, Word (.docx), IDML for InDesign and Affinity Publisher, and ODG for LibreOffice Draw.
Two smaller things worth a look
Check how the price works. Some services sell credits, some sell monthly plans that renew, some charge once. None of these is wrong, but a monthly plan you forget to cancel costs more than a folder of newsletters is worth. Ours is a one-time $49, tax included, for as many conversion jobs as you like, up to 20 files and 2 GB per job.
And check what happens when a file fails. Old and damaged .pub files exist, and no converter reads every one of them. A clear error is better than a blank PDF that looks like a success.
A fair way to choose
Pick the file you care about most, the one with the busiest layout. Run it through two or three services that pass the checks above. Then open each result next to the original, or next to an old printout if you no longer have Publisher. Your own eyes on your own file will tell you more than any comparison page, this one included.
Preview a file free and put the result next to the others.