diff --git a/booklore-api/build.gradle b/booklore-api/build.gradle
index d45283a8f..a54edd655 100644
--- a/booklore-api/build.gradle
+++ b/booklore-api/build.gradle
@@ -52,6 +52,7 @@ dependencies {
 
     // --- Book & Image Processing ---
     implementation 'org.apache.pdfbox:pdfbox:3.0.6'
+    implementation 'org.apache.pdfbox:pdfbox-io:3.0.6'
     implementation 'org.apache.pdfbox:xmpbox:3.0.6'
     implementation 'org.apache.pdfbox:jbig2-imageio:3.0.4'
     implementation 'com.github.jai-imageio:jai-imageio-core:1.4.0'
diff --git a/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/fileprocessor/PdfProcessor.java b/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/fileprocessor/PdfProcessor.java
index 6a6eed9d0..dfd6f09fb 100644
--- a/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/fileprocessor/PdfProcessor.java
+++ b/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/fileprocessor/PdfProcessor.java
@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@ import com.adityachandel.booklore.util.FileUtils;
 import lombok.extern.slf4j.Slf4j;
 import org.apache.commons.lang3.StringUtils;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.Loader;
+import org.apache.pdfbox.io.RandomAccessReadBufferedFile;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.pdmodel.PDDocument;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.rendering.ImageType;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.rendering.PDFRenderer;
@@ -58,7 +59,9 @@ public class PdfProcessor extends AbstractFileProcessor implements BookFileProce
 
     @Override
     public boolean generateCover(BookEntity bookEntity) {
-        try (PDDocument pdf = Loader.loadPDF(new File(FileUtils.getBookFullPath(bookEntity)))) {
+        File pdfFile = new File(FileUtils.getBookFullPath(bookEntity));
+        try (RandomAccessReadBufferedFile randomAccessRead = new RandomAccessReadBufferedFile(pdfFile);
+             PDDocument pdf = Loader.loadPDF(randomAccessRead)) {
             return generateCoverImageAndSave(bookEntity.getId(), pdf);
         } catch (OutOfMemoryError e) {
             // Note: Catching OOM is generally discouraged, but for batch processing
diff --git a/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/metadata/extractor/PdfMetadataExtractor.java b/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/metadata/extractor/PdfMetadataExtractor.java
index 8ff56d9db..c88929689 100644
--- a/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/metadata/extractor/PdfMetadataExtractor.java
+++ b/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/metadata/extractor/PdfMetadataExtractor.java
@@ -8,6 +8,7 @@ import org.apache.commons.lang3.StringUtils;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.Loader;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.cos.COSDictionary;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.cos.COSName;
+import org.apache.pdfbox.io.RandomAccessReadBufferedFile;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.pdmodel.PDDocument;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.pdmodel.PDDocumentInformation;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.pdmodel.common.PDMetadata;
@@ -45,7 +46,8 @@ public class PdfMetadataExtractor implements FileMetadataExtractor {
     @Override
     public byte[] extractCover(File file) {
         BufferedImage coverImage = null;
-        try (PDDocument pdf = Loader.loadPDF(file)) {
+        try (RandomAccessReadBufferedFile randomAccessRead = new RandomAccessReadBufferedFile(file);
+             PDDocument pdf = Loader.loadPDF(randomAccessRead)) {
             coverImage = new PDFRenderer(pdf).renderImageWithDPI(0, 300, ImageType.RGB);
             try (ByteArrayOutputStream baos = new ByteArrayOutputStream()) {
                 ImageIO.write(coverImage, "jpg", baos);
@@ -70,7 +72,8 @@ public class PdfMetadataExtractor implements FileMetadataExtractor {
 
         BookMetadata.BookMetadataBuilder metadataBuilder = BookMetadata.builder();
 
-        try (PDDocument pdf = Loader.loadPDF(file)) {
+        try (RandomAccessReadBufferedFile randomAccessRead = new RandomAccessReadBufferedFile(file);
+             PDDocument pdf = Loader.loadPDF(randomAccessRead)) {
             PDDocumentInformation info = pdf.getDocumentInformation();
 
             if (info != null) {
diff --git a/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/metadata/writer/PdfMetadataWriter.java b/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/metadata/writer/PdfMetadataWriter.java
index fc01e2218..0e9a3be69 100644
--- a/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/metadata/writer/PdfMetadataWriter.java
+++ b/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/metadata/writer/PdfMetadataWriter.java
@@ -6,6 +6,8 @@ import com.adityachandel.booklore.model.enums.BookFileType;
 import lombok.extern.slf4j.Slf4j;
 import org.apache.commons.lang3.StringUtils;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.Loader;
+import org.apache.pdfbox.io.IOUtils;
+import org.apache.pdfbox.io.RandomAccessReadBufferedFile;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.pdmodel.PDDocument;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.pdmodel.PDDocumentInformation;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.pdmodel.common.PDMetadata;
@@ -63,10 +65,12 @@ public class PdfMetadataWriter implements MetadataWriter {
             log.warn("Could not create PDF temp backup for {}: {}", file.getName(), e.getMessage());
         }
 
-        try (PDDocument pdf = Loader.loadPDF(file)) {
+        try (RandomAccessReadBufferedFile randomAccessRead = new RandomAccessReadBufferedFile(file);
+             PDDocument pdf = Loader.loadPDF(randomAccessRead, IOUtils.createMemoryOnlyStreamCache())) {
             pdf.setAllSecurityToBeRemoved(true);
             applyMetadataToDocument(pdf, metadataEntity, clear);
             tempFile = File.createTempFile("pdfmeta-", ".pdf");
+            // PDFBox 3.x saves in compressed mode by default
             pdf.save(tempFile);
             Files.move(tempFile.toPath(), filePath, StandardCopyOption.REPLACE_EXISTING);
             log.info("Successfully embedded metadata into PDF: {}", file.getName());
diff --git a/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/reader/PdfReaderService.java b/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/reader/PdfReaderService.java
index 245cd2aea..ccf2a9702 100644
--- a/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/reader/PdfReaderService.java
+++ b/booklore-api/src/main/java/com/adityachandel/booklore/service/reader/PdfReaderService.java
@@ -9,6 +9,7 @@ import com.adityachandel.booklore.util.FileUtils;
 import lombok.RequiredArgsConstructor;
 import lombok.extern.slf4j.Slf4j;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.Loader;
+import org.apache.pdfbox.io.RandomAccessReadBufferedFile;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.pdmodel.PDDocument;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.rendering.ImageType;
 import org.apache.pdfbox.rendering.PDFRenderer;
@@ -91,7 +92,8 @@ public class PdfReaderService {
         if (!Files.isReadable(pdfPath)) {
             throw new FileNotFoundException("PDF file is not readable: " + pdfPath);
         }
-        try (PDDocument document = Loader.loadPDF(new File(pdfPath.toFile().toURI()))) {
+        try (RandomAccessReadBufferedFile randomAccessRead = new RandomAccessReadBufferedFile(pdfPath.toFile());
+             PDDocument document = Loader.loadPDF(randomAccessRead)) {
             PDFRenderer renderer = new PDFRenderer(document);
             for (int i = 0; i < document.getNumberOfPages(); i++) {
                 BufferedImage image = null;