n8n Workflow: Split Large PDFs into 20-Page Chunks

Split Large PDFs into 20-Page Chunks—Automatically with n8n

This n8n workflow manually pulls PDF files from a specified Google Drive folder, detects each document’s page count using PDF.co, splits every PDF into 20-page chunks, and uploads the resulting chunk PDFs back to a target Google Drive folder—ready for downstream processing or storage.

What this workflow does

• Manual start: You execute the workflow in n8n on demand.
• Locate source PDFs: It searches a specific Google Drive source folder and lists the files inside.
• Prepare files for PDF.co: For each file, the workflow downloads it from Google Drive and uploads it to PDF.co to obtain a hosted file URL.
• Detect page counts: It calls PDF.co metadata endpoints to determine the total page count.
• Build 20-page ranges: Using that page count, it constructs page ranges to split the document into 20-page chunks.
• Generate split outputs: It calls PDF.co’s split endpoint to produce chunk PDF URLs for the specified ranges.
• Upload numbered chunks: The workflow downloads each chunk, assigns a numbered filename based on the original document name, and uploads the chunk PDFs to the destination Google Drive folder.

Use cases

• Chunking long PDFs (reports, manuals, scan bundles) to reduce handling time for review or indexing.
• Preparing documents for OCR, search, or document processing pipelines that work best at a fixed page size.
• Organizing large PDF libraries by splitting them into consistent sections for easier sharing and archiving.

Technical details

• Integrations: Google Drive (OAuth2), PDF.co (API credentials)
• n8n nodes/tools: google drive, http request, n8n-nodes-pdfco (PDF.co API), plus code, merge, and sticky note nodes to coordinate logic

Setup notes: Configure Google Drive source/destination folder IDs and PDF.co permissions for file upload, info, and split operations. You can also adjust the chunk size logic (default: 20 pages) to change page ranges per output file.