How to automatically compress PDFs in monday.com
Key takeaways
- Can monday.com compress PDFs automatically?
- Yes. The File Compress app by ColumnMate adds a Compress PDFs automation action that runs on any monday.com trigger and optimizes new PDFs in a Files column.
- Is the automatic compression lossless?
- Yes. It rewrites each PDF with compressed object streams and strips document metadata. No pages, text, form fields, or image quality are changed.
- What is a good trigger for PDF compression?
- A status change is often best — compress when an item reaches "Received", "Signed", or "Final" so you are only optimizing documents that matter.
- How much will this save?
- Text-based and exported PDFs typically shrink 5–25%. Scanned PDFs see little benefit because their images are not re-encoded.
Automatically compressing PDFs in monday.com uses a native automation and the Compress PDFs action from the File Compress app by ColumnMate. When a trigger fires, the action reads new PDFs from a source Files column, rewrites them with the pdf-lib library using cross-reference object streams, strips document metadata, and writes the optimized files to a target column.
Why automate it instead of doing it by hand
PDFs pile up on operational boards: signed contracts, vendor invoices, inspection reports, weekly exports. Each one is only a few megabytes, but a board with two years of them is carrying gigabytes of avoidable structure and metadata. Automation catches every file on arrival so the number never grows unchecked.
Because the optimization is lossless, there is no review step needed — a compressed contract is byte-for-byte identical on every page to the one that was signed.
Which trigger fits a document workflow?
| Trigger | Example recipe |
|---|---|
| Status changes | When status is Signed, compress PDFs from Contract into Contract |
| File column changes | When Invoice changes, compress PDFs from Invoice into Invoice |
| Button clicked | A Compress button on each row for ad-hoc use |
Status triggers are usually the cleanest — you compress only documents that have reached a meaningful state.
Step by step
- An admin installs File Compress from the monday.com marketplace.
- Open the board and go to the Automations Center.
- Add automation, search File Compress, and choose a compress PDFs recipe.
- Set the source column, target column, and level — use medium or high to also remove metadata.
- Enable it and test with one upload.
What it will not fix
Scan-heavy PDFs. If your incoming documents are photographed or scanned pages, most of their size is embedded images that structural optimization does not touch. Handle those at the source — lower scan DPI, grayscale, or image compression before assembly. The full reasoning is in how to reduce PDF file size in monday.com.
Automation also ignores PDFs that were on the board before you enabled it. To clear that backlog, add a second recipe on a button or status trigger and fire it across the existing items with a batch status change — see how to compress PDF files in monday.com.
The short version
Add the File Compress Compress PDFs recipe in the Automations Center, choose a status or file-column trigger, set source and target columns and a medium/high level, and turn it on. It is lossless, so no review is needed, and loop prevention makes replace-in-place safe. Scanned PDFs still need an upstream fix. See the setup guide.
Frequently asked questions
- How do I automate PDF compression in monday.com?
- In the board's Automations Center, add the File Compress "compress PDFs" recipe, set the source Files column, the target column, and a level of medium or high, then enable it.
- Will the automation strip metadata from every PDF?
- At medium and high levels, yes — title, author, subject, keywords, producer, and creator fields are cleared. Low leaves metadata intact.
- Can I keep the original PDF?
- Yes. Set the target column to a different Files column from the source.
- Does it work on password-protected PDFs?
- It tries to load them while ignoring encryption. If a PDF cannot be processed, it is skipped and the original stays.
- What happens to non-PDF files in the column?
- They are ignored. The Compress PDFs action only acts on files with a .pdf extension.
Zack
File Compress Developer at ColumnMate. Writes about file management, storage, and automation inside monday.com.
Related reading
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