Convert PDF to Text File in Power Automate: Turn Scanned Contracts into a Searchable SharePoint Corpus with PDF4me
· 25 min read
PDF4me Extract Text and Images is a Power Automate action that returns the text layer of a PDF as an array. Paired with OCR upstream and a Compose join downstream, this flow turns every PDF dropped in a SharePoint library into a matching .txt file, ready for AI search.
Search for how to do this and the first result is Microsoft's own PDF actions reference, which describes Power Automate Desktop actions. They do not exist in a cloud flow. That single detail is why the next two results are a Reddit thread and a Power Platform community thread of people asking the same question and not getting a straight answer. This flow is the straight answer, and it runs entirely in the cloud on standard-tier connectors.
The flow at a glance
1. When a file is created (properties only)
SharePoint trigger on the library, scoped to the RagInput folder. Returns metadata, not bytes.
2. Get file content
Fetches the actual PDF bytes using the identifier the trigger handed over.
3. Convert PDF to editable PDF using OCR
Adds a text layer to scans. OCR Only When Needed skips PDFs that already have one.
4. Extract Text and Images
Returns the text as an array. Extract Images stays No.
5. Compose
join() flattens the texts array into one newline separated string.
6. Create file
SharePoint writes the string to /Shared Documents/RagText as .txt.