"Like a book" does not mean pretending every PDF is a novel. It means giving the reader a stable place to look, a sensible rhythm, and enough room for the text to become the focus.
What Paper changes
A PDF is excellent at preserving where things sit on a page. A book is better at carrying you through words over time. Paper uses the text layer of a public PDF to bridge that difference: headings become pauses, paragraphs become paragraphs, and the reading column responds to the screen.
Continuous reading
Scroll through the document as a readable stream instead of repeatedly fitting a page to the viewport.
Quiet typography
A serif reading face, measured line length, and generous spacing make the page feel closer to reading than operating software.
Useful hierarchy
Paper attempts to retain headings and remove repeated page furniture so the structure survives the reflow.
Source still matters
The original URL remains the source of truth. Use it whenever a visual page reference or exact layout is important.
When a book-like view helps
Use it for a public-domain book, an essay, a report, a course reading, or a paper you want to understand rather than print. It is less suitable for forms, architectural plans, highly visual brochures, or documents where a chart's position carries meaning.
Currently supported formats
Paper supports public HTTP(S) URLs pointing to selectable-text PDFs, up to 30 MB. It does not yet support scanned PDFs, OCR, or EPUB and other book formats.
Start with the public source you already have.
Read a PDF like a bookQuestions
Does reflow change the original PDF?
No. Paper creates a separate reading view; the source file and its original page layout remain unchanged.
Will every PDF look exactly like a book?
No. Text-heavy documents work best. Complex layouts, scans, forms, figures, and equations may need the original viewer.