How to compare two files
Drop the older file on Original and the newer one on Changed. The differences show straight away: removed text in red, added text in green, changed words marked inside each line. Both files are read by your browser and never uploaded.
Add the original
A PDF, Word document, Excel or CSV file, a picture, any text or code file, or a whole folder. Choose two files at once to fill both sides.
Add the changed one
The two can be different kinds: a Word draft against the PDF that was signed, or a CSV export against an Excel sheet.
Read and save the differences
Show only the changes or everything, side by side or in one column. Spreadsheet differences save as an Excel or CSV file with what changed in each row.
PDF and Word documents
Documents are compared by their text, line by line, and every changed line shows the words that changed. Lines that are only a little different count as changed rather than removed and added, so an edited sentence reads as one change. PDFs show which page each line is on, and Pages compares the pages as pictures, which also catches a moved logo, a new signature or a changed table border.
- Ignore spaces and line breaks inside lines, or ignore case
- Word tables compared row by row, list numbers and bullets kept
- JSON compared after laying both out the same way
Formatting alone (bold, a new font) is not a change of text, so it shows only in Pages for PDFs.
Excel and CSV: rows matched by an ID
Two exports of the same list rarely keep their rows in the same order. Pick the column that identifies a row, such as a customer number, an invoice number or an email address, and each row is matched with its partner wherever it is. Columns that are filled and unique on both sides are suggested first. Several columns can form the key together, for example a date and an account.
| Result | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Changed | The same row on both sides with different values; each changed cell shows old and new |
| Added | Only in the changed file |
| Removed | Only in the original |
| New or removed column | Columns are matched by their heading, wherever they are |
Numbers are compared as numbers, so 1.50 and 1.5 are the same, and spaces around a value are ignored. Without a key, rows are matched by position, with inserted and deleted rows found so everything after them still lines up.
Screenshots and pictures
Two screenshots of a web page, a design before and after, two versions of a scan: the pictures are compared pixel by pixel and every changed area gets a box. Drag the divider to wipe between them, see them side by side, or show only the differences. The tolerance slider ignores tiny colour shifts from compression.
Two folders
Files are matched by their path inside each folder and compared by content with SHA-256, so a file saved again unchanged still counts as the same. A file that turns up under another name or in another folder with the same contents is listed as moved. Open any changed pair to see its differences.
Specs
| Documents | PDF (text, and pages as pictures), DOCX, TXT, Markdown, HTML, JSON, YAML, XML, code, subtitles, EML |
|---|---|
| Spreadsheets | XLSX (any sheet), CSV, TSV |
| Pictures | PNG, JPG, WebP, GIF, BMP, AVIF, TIFF, HEIC; a PDF's first page |
| Anything else | Compared byte by byte: identical or where they first differ, with SHA-256 of each |
| Export | Spreadsheet differences as XLSX or CSV |
| Browsers | Current Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari; folders need a browser that can pick one (all current ones on a computer) |
| Price | Free, no account |
Questions
No. Both files are read and compared by your browser. Nothing is sent anywhere, so contracts, payroll sheets and other private files are safe to compare.
Yes. PDFs, Word documents and text files are compared by their text, so a Word draft can be checked against the PDF that was sent or signed.
By the column you pick, for example a customer ID or an email address, so rows that moved or were sorted differently are still matched. Several columns can form the key together. Without a key, rows are matched by position, and inserted or deleted rows are found so the rows after them still line up.
A scanned PDF has no text to compare. Switch to Pages to compare the page pictures, or read the text first with Image and PDF to text.