PDF editor
Compare PDF editors with which you edit, merge, convert and sign PDF files, from free online tools to software for the whole company.
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PDF editor at a glance
Price indications and features as stated by the suppliers. Ratings are the average of the reviews on SoftwareWatcher.
| Software | Rating | From per month | Budget per user per month | Free trial account | Demo | Cloud | Dutch-language |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ABBYY FineReader PDF | – | From € 16 per licence per month | – | Yes | – | – | Yes |
| Able2Extract Professional | – | From $49,95 for a 30-day licence | – | Yes | – | – | – |
| Adobe Acrobat | – | From € 18,30 per month on an annual contract | – | Yes | – | Yes | Yes |
| Bluebeam Revu | – | From € 240 per user per year | – | Yes | – | Yes | – |
| DocFly | – | €6,99 | – | – | – | Yes | – |
| DocHub | – | From € 11 per user per month | – | Yes | – | Yes | – |
| Foxit PDF Editor | – | From € 10,96 per user per month with an annual plan | – | Yes | – | Yes | – |
| iLovePDF | – | From € 9 per user per month | – | – | – | Yes | Yes |
| Lumin PDF | – | From $9 per month | – | Yes | Yes | Yes | – |
| Nitro PDF | – | From € 14 per user per month if you pay annually | – | Yes | – | – | – |
| PDF Architect | – | From € 109 per user per year | – | – | – | – | – |
| PDF Expert | – | From € 80 per user per year (excl. VAT) | – | Yes | – | – | – |
| PDF-XChange Editor | – | From € 57 one-off per user (excl. VAT) | – | – | – | – | – |
| PDF24 | – | On request | – | – | – | Yes | Yes |
| PDFCreator | – | From € 25 per workstation per year | – | Yes | – | – | – |
| PDFelement | – | From € 89 per year | – | Yes | – | – | – |
| PDFengine | – | From € 48 per year | – | – | – | Yes | Yes |
| PDFescape | – | From $5.99 per month | – | Yes | – | Yes | – |
| pdfFiller | – | €20 | – | Yes | – | Yes | – |
| PDFgear | – | On request | – | – | – | Yes | – |
| PDFsam | – | From € 33,90 per user per year | – | Yes | – | – | – |
| PDNob PDF Editor | – | From $49,99 per year | – | Yes | – | – | – |
| Sejda | – | From € 8,50 per user per month | – | – | – | Yes | Yes |
| Smallpdf | – | €10 | – | Yes | – | Yes | Yes |
| Soda PDF | – | €13 | – | – | – | Yes | – |
| Stirling PDF | – | From $99 per month for 100 users | – | – | Yes | Yes | – |
| Tungsten Power PDF | – | From € 108 one-off per licence (excl. VAT) | – | Yes | – | – | – |
| UPDF | – | From $49,99 per year | – | Yes | – | – | Yes |
| Xodo PDF Studio | – | From $19,99 per month | – | Yes | – | – | – |
Compare PDF editors
With a PDF editor you can edit a PDF without going back to the original Word or Excel file. You adjust text and images, merge files, split or delete pages and convert a PDF to Word or Excel. You can often also fill in forms, add a signature and make scans searchable with text recognition (OCR). If you only occasionally want to adjust a single file, a free PDF editor is often enough. Companies that work with PDFs every day are more likely to choose PDF software with a licence per user and central management.
Editing PDFs: online or with a program?
The first choice is where your files are processed. Online tools such as iLovePDF, Smallpdf, Sejda and PDF24 work in the browser: you upload a file and download the result. A PDF program such as Adobe Acrobat, Foxit PDF Editor or PDF Architect you install on your computer. Many providers offer both. PDF Expert is available for Mac, iPhone and iPad, and Stirling PDF can be run on your own server.
Editing a PDF is free with many providers, but usually with a limit: a maximum number of tasks per hour or day, or a limit on file size. If you are looking for a free PDF editor, check whether that limit fits what you want to do.
What should you look out for?
- Features: almost every package can merge and split pages. Changing existing text, creating forms, OCR and redaction are often only in the more expensive versions.
- Confidential documents: with online tools your files go to the provider's server. Find out how long they stay there, or choose software that works on your own computer.
- Licence: you pay per user per month or per year, or once for a single version. Ask about volume discounts if you have several users.
- Operating system: not every program for editing a PDF is available for Windows, macOS and mobile. Check this for all your team's devices.
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