A structured comparison of every PDF/A conformance level defined by ISO 19005, mapped to its practical archival use case. The matrix exists because the PDF/A levels are commonly conflated, and choosing the wrong level routinely causes archive ingestion failures.
Methodology
Each row is populated from the ISO 19005 part covering that level (Part 1 for PDF/A-1, Part 2 for PDF/A-2, Part 3 for PDF/A-3). Requirements are extracted as boolean flags or short strings; use_case captures the archival scenario the level was designed for. No transformation is applied — the matrix is a reference, not a measurement.
See the site-wide research methodology for shared test conditions and tooling.
Dataset
| PDF/A level | ISO standard | Embedded fonts required | Color profiles required | Digital signatures allowed | Typical use case |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PDF/A-1a | ISO 19005-1 (Level A) | Required | Required (ICC) | Allowed | Long-term preservation with tagged structure for accessibility and reflow |
| PDF/A-1b | ISO 19005-1 (Level B) | Required | Required (ICC) | Allowed | Long-term preservation guaranteeing visual reproduction only (no tagging) |
| PDF/A-2a | ISO 19005-2 (Level A) | Required | Required (ICC) | Allowed | PDF 1.7 features (transparency, JPEG 2000, OpenType, layers) with tagging |
| PDF/A-2b | ISO 19005-2 (Level B) | Required | Required (ICC) | Allowed | PDF 1.7 features without tagging — visual fidelity only |
| PDF/A-2u | ISO 19005-2 (Level U) | Required | Required (ICC) | Allowed | PDF 1.7 features with Unicode text mapping (no tagging) |
| PDF/A-3a | ISO 19005-3 (Level A) | Required | Required (ICC) | Allowed | Tagged + embedded source files in any format (e.g., XML invoice with PDF rendering) |
| PDF/A-3b | ISO 19005-3 (Level B) | Required | Required (ICC) | Allowed | Embedded source files with visual fidelity only |
| PDF/A-3u | ISO 19005-3 (Level U) | Required | Required (ICC) | Allowed | Embedded source files with Unicode mapping |
Download raw data
The raw CSV contains every row in the table above plus any columns omitted from the rendered view.
Download CSVCitations
- ISO 19005-1:2005 — PDF/A-1 (accessed )
- ISO 19005-2:2011 — PDF/A-2 (accessed )
- ISO 19005-3:2012 — PDF/A-3 (accessed )