When you're ready to apply, you export your resume to PDF with the Download button: it opens your browser's print dialog with the resume laid out exactly as the live preview shows it, and you save it as a PDF from there. The output has real selectable text, no watermark on any plan, and no export paywall — the download button works the same whether you've paid or not.
Exporting in one click
- Open your resume in the editor and check the live preview on the right — that is, pixel for pixel, what you're about to export.
- Select Download.
- Your browser's print dialog opens. Set the destination to "Save as PDF" (Chrome and Edge call it exactly that; Safari has a PDF menu in the bottom-left corner of its dialog; Firefox offers "Save to PDF").
- Confirm the paper size matches your template setting — Letter or A4, whichever you chose in the Templates drawer.
- Save, choosing a sensible file name (more on that below).
That's the whole flow. Because the preview and the export are rendered from the same layout code, there is no separate "export engine" that could disagree with what you saw — we call this print-true, and it means proofreading the preview is proofreading the PDF.
What you get, on every plan
- No watermark, ever. Not on free, not in guest mode. If a resume tool's business model depends on defacing your document until you pay, that tells you who the document really serves. Ours doesn't; the free tier's limits are on resume count, not export quality — itemized in the free plan explainer.
- Real, selectable text. The PDF contains actual text, not an image of text, so applicant tracking systems can extract it. This is the property that matters most for parsing, as PDF or Word resume explains.
- Faithful layout. Fonts, spacing, accents, and page breaks match the preview, because they're the same rendering.
DOCX export
Not yet available. Workplacea currently exports PDF only. If a specific application portal demands a Word file — rarer every year, but it happens — you have two workable options: paste your content into a plain Word document with simple headings (tedious but clean), or check whether the portal actually accepts PDF after all, since many list both. When DOCX export ships, it will appear alongside Download; we won't hide it behind a plan tier.
Also not yet available, while we're being complete: cover letter documents and export through a Chrome extension or mobile app.
Naming the file
Browsers pre-fill the save dialog with the page title, which is rarely what you want a recruiter to see. Take five seconds and rename. The convention that never fails:
Firstname-Lastname-Resume.pdf — for example, Maya-Petrovic-Resume.pdf.
Add the role when you're managing tailored variants: Maya-Petrovic-Resume-Product-Manager.pdf. Avoid resume_final_v3_REAL.pdf energy: no version suffixes, no dates, no all-caps, no spaces if you can help it (hyphens read better in download lists and survive every upload form). Recruiters see the filename in their file browser and often in the ATS itself — it's a tiny first impression, so spend it on your name.
The 30-second verification test
Before you send a PDF anywhere, verify it the way a parser would read it:
- Open the saved PDF in any viewer.
- Select all the text (Ctrl+A or Cmd+A) and copy it.
- Paste into a blank text file or empty document.
You should see all of your content as readable text, in the correct top-to-bottom order. Since Workplacea templates are single-column by design, the order will be right — this test mostly confirms the save step didn't go through a weird driver. If the paste is ever empty or garbled, you almost certainly printed through something other than the browser's built-in "Save as PDF" (see below). For an even fuller check, paste that text into the free checker and confirm the score matches what the editor showed.
Troubleshooting
- Watermark or header/footer text on the page? Not ours — that's the browser's print headers and footers. In the print dialog, expand "More settings" and disable "Headers and footers".
- Content cut off at the edges? Confirm margins are set to "Default" or "None" in the print dialog and that the dialog's paper size matches your template's Letter/A4 setting. A mismatch (A4 template, Letter paper) shifts the layout.
- Awkward page break mid-section? Adjust density in the Templates drawer, trim a bullet or two, or reorder sections — the preview shows breaks live, so you can tune until the break lands cleanly. Template choice affects pagination too; see templates and ATS safety.
- Wrong fonts in the output? Use the browser's own "Save as PDF" destination rather than a third-party PDF printer driver ("Microsoft Print to PDF" is fine; older PDF printer utilities sometimes rasterize text). The browser destination embeds fonts correctly.
- Blank page at the end? Usually a stray print margin. Set margins to default and check the preview's final page; if the resume genuinely ends near a page boundary, one density notch tighter fixes it.
Frequently asked questions
Is PDF export really free, with the full layout?
Yes. Watermark-free PDF export is part of the free plan and guest mode alike. There's no locked template, no quality tier, no "premium fonts" upsell in the export path.
Why use the browser print dialog instead of a custom export button?
Because it's the most reliable PDF generator on your machine and it guarantees print-true output — the same rendering you previewed is the rendering that saves. A server-side exporter would add a second rendering path that could drift from the preview, which is exactly the class of surprise we built the product to avoid.
Can I export a Word (.docx) file?
Not yet available. PDF is the only export today. For portals that hard-require DOCX, rebuild the content in a plain Word document for that one application, keeping Workplacea as your source of truth.
Does exporting use up anything on the free plan?
No. Export is unlimited — download as many times as you like, after every edit. The free plan's caps apply to how many resumes and variants you keep, never to downloads.
Get your PDF out the door
Open the editor, select Download, and run the copy-paste test on the result once — after that you can trust the pipeline. If an export ever looks different from your preview, email contact@workplacea.com with your browser name and we'll chase it down.