Pages: Convert PDF to ePub for Apple Books

Opening that PDF in Adobe Acrobat Pro and exporting to Word .docx is still no guarantee that the resulting Word document will have the very same appearance as the PDF. An even worse expectation when opening that PDF in a recent version of Microsoft Word, and its attempt to convert it back to Word .docx.

You need the original word processor and source document, hoping that there is some means to export directly to EPUB, or save in Word .docx format. Even then, Apple makes no guarantee that a translation of an opened Word document into a Pages document will occur flawlessly, especially if there are unsupported Word features in that source document.

The free Affinity v3 studio application can open an existing PDF in its Publisher app and allow you to make changes to the PDF content, then export it as an EPUB that opens in Apple Books. I just tested this with a 179-page PDF, so I know it works. Here is a YouTube video (40 min) explaining this Affinity v3 Publisher usage.

Lavinia567 wrote:

I would like to request a feature that allows Pages to 'Open' a PDF and automatically convert it into an editable Pages document

For that, you need to ask via

Product Feedback - Apple

But I don't think it will happen.

What did you use to create your original text which has somehow been converted to pdf? The best thing would be to convert that original directly to epub or to Pages and then epub instead of messing with a pdf.

A partner may be helpful in your situation:

https://itunespartner.apple.com/books/partners

VikingOSX wrote:

The free Affinity v3 studio application can open an existing PDF in its Publisher app and allow you to make changes to the PDF content, then export it as an EPUB that opens in Apple Books.

Very useful to know, thanks!