From time to time, users say that one can save a PDF to Word by using “Save As” or other means. While it’s true that the result is a Word document, after a dozen attempts with a Japanese-language PDF using various output types (docx, HTML, RTF, ODT, etc.) I learned two things: (1) some output formats (including the recommended ODT) fail to convert (2) those that do convert produce a word document with each page of the original PDF inserted or embedded into the Word document as an image. So while it’s technically true that PDF to Word is possible, the result (flowing text, etc.) isn’t exactly what many people envision. My question: is there way to get a Word document output in Japanese that is actual Word text and not a collection of embedded images?
Yes and no.
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Your first problem has nothing to do with japanese language. PDF is something like a container for a programming language to move/modify graphic objects (some of them you may interpret as letters, but this is only one aspect).
Also pdf is one format produced by scanners and I could show you a bunch of archived pdf-documents produced by scanning pages and containing nothing but images of pages. Converting them will give exactly your experience.
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So your first step should be to find out more of the contents of your pdf. (Try to open them in LibreOffice-Draw and see if you only have big graphics objects.)
The solution to this is using OCR-software. Tessaract is a free engine. OCR reads the optical information and will try to make text from it... . Some software to edit pdf also have options to save in other format, but remember: Not all pdf contains isolated letters, some have only big images of pages. AI can also help in this situation, but as always at the risk of inventing stuff...
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thanks for the info and tips!