If y'all want to edit a PDF or fill in a PDF form, y'all may be thinking that your only choice is to impress it out, make full information technology in with a pen then scan it or photograph it and ship it back. Luckily it'south not necessary to go to such lengths. There are free apps that brand information technology easy to edit text in a PDF, including adding your signature, adding comments, and redacting information. You can too combine lots of PDFs, rotate pages, reduce the size, and fifty-fifty convert PDFs to Give-and-take, Excel and other file types. Best of all information technology doesn't have to toll a thing.

Hither we look at a collection of PDF apps that are either completely free, or have a free trial version with a lot of the necessary functionality for a one-off PDF editing requirement.

Some of these apps do sure things better than others, so the all-time PDF editor for you volition depend on what your detail needs. For example, if you desire a PDF editor that can employ OCR (optical graphic symbol recognition) to read the text on a page you take scanned, and allow y'all to edit it, we take an choice that can allow yous to do that.

Alternatively, if yous are looking for a PDF editor that's simple to utilise and flexible plenty to allow you fill in a grade without pulling out your hair, we have one below. We have even found a PDF tool that will let you import a PDF into Word (or Pages) and edit it there.

We have looked at the following features and abilities of the PDF Editors reviewed here:

Import: How faithful to the original PDF is the PDF editor? Does it maintain fonts and spacing? Can y'all open the PDF in Discussion, Excel etc?

Editing: Can you select text from the original PDF? Is the new text added in a divide text box? How easy is it to edit and delete content from the PDF? Can you lot movement content effectually? Does the text you add maintain the manner and formatting of the original PDF? Can you add hyperlinks or attach documents? Can you lot add images?

Collaboration: What markup tools are bachelor? Tin you highlight, underline, or strikethrough text? Can you lot use freehand drawing tools and an eraser. Can you add together stamps? Can you track who reads and edits?

Signing: Tin can yous add a signature? Is this signature scanned, imported, or typed? How many signatures tin can you save?

Saving: Can y'all resize the PDF? Tin yous stitch pages from multiple docs? Can you delete pages? Tin can you rotate pages?

Find & Supersede: Tin can the PDF editor search the PDF? Can you find and supersede words? Can you redact words?

OCR: Tin the PDF editor read a scanned page - and can you edit that?

Watermark: Does it add a watermark? Tin you add together your own watermark?

Don't forget that macOS comes with some PDF editing capabilities of its own in Preview, and you can read a bit more about how to piece of work with it intips for using Preview to edit a PDF on a Mac.

Preview

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There is a free PDF editor already bachelor on your Mac and it's pretty proficient. It'southward got some limitations, simply it's likely to offer enough tools for you if you merely need to fill in some responses to questions on a PDF.

You lot can utilize Preview to add text (in text boxes), you can change the size, color and font you employ. It tin can be a bit fiddly to get the text box to line upward with the text on the page, merely information technology's not impossible.

You lot can also perform deportment similar strike-through - initially we used the line shape, but then nosotros discovered that it is possible to select strike-through from the carte (Tools > Annotate). You lot can as well underline text the same way. These options are also available from the highlighter palette.

Under Annotate in the menu are options for adding a speech chimera. You can also add comments in the course of sticky notes.

Our spellings were checked as we typed - indicated past the usual squiggly line.

Calculation a signature is simple, with three options for doing and then: using a trackpad, iPhone or iPad, or by signing your name on a piece of paper and holding information technology up to the photographic camera. Yous can save multiple signatures and add them to the document easily. We have a guide to calculation a signature to a PDF hither.

It'due south piece of cake to shuffle pages and add to, and delete pages from, a Preview PDF. If yous can't already run into the thumbnail view on the left click on the drib down box in a higher place the A icon and cull Thumbnails.

Shhow thumbnails Preview

Now that you lot can run into the thumbnails it is like shooting fish in a barrel to shuffle folio order, delete a page, and yous can even elevate and drop another PDF into the thumbnail column to add it.

Information technology is besides easy to rotate pages (click on the page in the Thumbnail view and click on the rotate icon in the menu).

You can consign your PDF as a JPEG, TIFF, only there are no options for exporting to other apps, such as Word or Pages.

1 of the newest features of Preview is an OCR - optical character recognition. If you are running macOS Monterey and you open anything in Preview - be it a PDF or a photograph - you volition be able to select most forms of text and cutting and paste it in to a text certificate. Nosotros were able to select text, even if it was on a slant, and generally the results were practiced.

As we said above, Preview offers plenty features if all you demand to do is enter a bit of text and sign a PDF. And so if you are trying to fill in an application form or filling in a few yes or no checkboxes, it'south likely to be sufficient. Those wanting a little more flexibility may find that Preview might not take enough features... in which instance nosotros accept some options below that might prove more tempting.

Before you look at those, exist sure to also read our full guide tousing Preview on the Mac.

Adobe Reader DC

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Acrobat Reader DC is free but some of the features aren't - to access them you would need to motion to the Pro tier that comes with a monthly, annual or prepaid annual subscription (information technology's £25.28/$24.99 a month if you don't commit for the year, £fifteen.17/$14.99 a month otherwise, and £181.10/$179.88 for the full year when y'all pay upwardly front end).

However, there are a lot of features that are available for complimentary. You'll observe these in the Comment and Fill up & Sign sections.

To add together text to the PDF choose Fill & Sign. Here yous will also detect the options to add a tick or a cantankerous, a circle, or a line. The signature choice is hither likewise, we'll await at that in more detail beneath.

Comment options include the ability to add a speech bubble, highlight, underline, and strike-through words. In fact, you lot tin can strike-through and add a related comment. All your comments will announced in the sidebar on the correct.

At that place are likewise tools here to draw and erase what yous draw. A stamp tool with options similar Approved, Revised, Confidential, Sign Hither, and the option to import your own (these need to exist in the PDF format, simply it could be a mode to add an image).

When adding a signature you have options to Type, Draw (using a mouse or trackpad), or Image. If y'all opt for the latter you could import a scan or photograph of your signature - you tin can import any image this way, but it volition appear translucent, with the background appearing backside it as you can see from our illustration.

Acrobat Reader offers enough features to make information technology worth the download. It tin can exist a tad annoying when it looks like you lot need to get a subscription to employ features that it turns out tin can exist performed without signing up, so beware of this earlier yous spend

LibreOffice

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LibreOffice is a free role suite with some handy features if you are wanting to edit and update PDFs.

Considering it'south an office suite yous benefit from all the Office-like features and familiar menus.

We were able to open a PDF in LibreOffice and edit text and add text and images. We weren't able to add together a signature, but this would be simple enough if you already had the signature as an epitome file.

You lot can also create a PDF from a certificate you create in LibreOffice, just as you can from Pages or Discussion. Create the certificate so cull File > Export every bit PDF.

While information technology's not a dedicated PDF editor or creator you tin can exercise many of the things you lot are likely to want to do to a basic PDF, so its a skillful option that comes with various benefits on account of it beingness a decent culling to Microsoft Office. Read our circular up of the best word processors for Mac for more information.

PDFelement Pro

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Wondershare'south PDFelement app (currently version viii) brings a streamlined interface and boosted capabilities that make information technology a fine choice for those who want pro level features at an affordable price, although at that place is, every bit with and so many of these options, a complimentary trial version.

With the software you tin can create new PDFs from scratch, catechumen Word, Excel or Powerpoint files, likewise as chop-chop producing forms that tin can be used online, replete with dropdown menus.

Editing an existing PDF is straightforward, with tools for adding text or comments, annotating images and documents, plus the standard option of inserting a signature created on the trackpad. There's besides OCR capabilities that make it easy to scan in documents and have them converted into usable PDFs in minutes.

PDFelement is a comprehensive package with an interface that's elementary and intuitive. To requite it test run you can accept advantage of the gratis trial, but this is restricted by the inclusion of a watermark on all saved files, only able to open a maximum of three page PDFs, and no saves for files created via OCR.

To remove these you'll demand the full Pro license which costs $49.99 for half a year, $79.99 (approx £lx) per year or $129.99 (approx £98) for a perpetual license.

For more tips, accept a look atusing PDFelement Pro on a Mac.

If you'd prefer a free version that you don't take to pay for, PDF Reader is also from Wondershare, but this is an entirely free version of PDFelement that you lot tin can use on your iPad or iPhone to read, edit, annotate, convert and sign PDFs. You just demand to annals with Wondershare to utilise the app.

We're mentioning it here considering, while information technology'south non a Mac app, you might be happy to edit the PDF on your iPad or iPhone for the sake of getting a free pick. Incidentally, in that location is a Windows version of PDF Reader.

Once the app was downloaded to our iPhone nosotros were able to open PDFs that were stored in iCloud, edit text and add our ain. You tin add crosses and ticks (checks), describe on the PDF, strike through text, highlight text, and create and add a signature. Once your changes are made you can salvage.

Download Wondershare's PDF Reader from the iOS App Store

PDF Expert (macOS)

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PDFExpert for Mac from Readdle offers a seven-solar day full-featured free trial, which could go far ideal if you just need a solution now and don't expect to be editing PDFs once again for a while. If you practice need it for longer than a calendar week it costs £69.99/£79.99 a yr on subscription, or £122.99/$139.99 if you choose the Lifetime program.

We found PDFExpert did a good task of maintaining the fonts, style and formatting of the original PDF.

There are two options for editing that you can find in the menu at the top of the page: Annotate and Edit. Under Comment y'all will find the tool to easily add text to the PDF. You lot can choose the font and colour of the text here.

However, you will discover the amend editing tools nether Edit. Here you have the option to actually edit the text already on the page, add images, add together hyperlinks, and redact sensitive information (yous tin choose to black out names, or y'all can search for a specific word and delete every occurrence of that.)

We were able to select text and motion it around the folio. Only every bit we institute with all the PDF editors here, it wasn't possible to elevate and drop text betwixt pages (to become effectually this we were able to cutting and paste though and still make a good-looking document).

Back to the Annotate tab. Here you will detect options to highlight, underline, or strike-through text, too as a pan tool that means y'all tin can draw freehand in whatever colour, as well equally change the line width and opacity. There's also a crop tool here. In Annotate you can too add sticky notes and stamps (due east.g. an Approval). You lot'll see a column of existing annotations on the left and so its easy to come across what edits have been fabricated and when. These annotations can exist exported as HTML, text or markdown.

Calculation a signature is likewise washed via the Comment tab. You tin can add together more than one signature and these are added via the keyboard, trackpad, or an image. To add the signature to your PDF just drag and drop from the signature pane. You an besides add a watermark yourself, perchance your company logo, rather than having one added for you as is the instance with some of the other trials looked at hither.

Resizing a large PDF was easy thanks to a Loftier/Low slider that indicated the size of the resulting file. There was also the option to merge files, combine multiple documents into one PDF, or individual pages from multiple documents.

We had ane PDF that was scanned on our iPhone via the Notes app (nosotros explain how to browse a document with an iPhone here). Obviously such a document will only be recognised by the PDF editor if the editor has OCR abilities that are unlocked in the trial. PDFExpert couldn't do this and so nosotros weren't able to edit the text in the scanned document, although nosotros were able to add hyperlinks to sections of that certificate. Obviously we couldn't search the scanned document, or edit the text in that location.

We were able to search normal PDFs though, and nosotros were able to search for a discussion and redact every occurrence of information technology either by blacking it out, or deleting it.

We were able to consign the PDF into Word, PowerPoint and Excel, besides as to Text and Image.

It'due south a free seven day trial, so if you need the software for longer than that and don't desire to pay upwards so yous would have to look elsewhere. Just if you don't need something long term this trial offers everything you demand.

pdfFiller

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pdfFiller from airSlate is another option if you lot desire to edit and adapt a PDF. As with the other paid for PDF editors in this round upwards, at that place is a xxx-mean solar day complimentary trial that you can utilise. You will demand to enter your details, but since you can sign in with Apple you lot tin can avoid sharing your electronic mail address, which is dainty.

Information technology'southward web based, although in that location is an iOS app y'all tin can employ.
You can add and edit existing text, copy and paste, and add together images to the PDF. It's likewise possible to add a signature - which is fifty-fifty electronically verified.

Y'all tin can hands combine multiple PDFs in one file. You can relieve your PDFs and collaborate with others while editing. If you are working as part of a team the lock and encryption options will be useful.
It is even possible to create and host fillable forms that multiple users can fill in, and y'all tin consign the data added.

Plus it is possible to catechumen documents from Word, JPG, Excel, PowerPoint and and so on and create PDFs from them.

PDF Candy

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While there is no Mac app for PDF Candy, Mac users can use the complimentary online version to add text to a PDF, also as underlines, strike-throughs, and add signatures.

Yous tin can besides compress and merge PDFs, rearrange pages, delete pages, rotate and crop PDFs.

Unfortunately you tin't add or change the text, so if you need to do that this isn't going to suffice (although you can place white overlay over content you want to hide).

You can also catechumen PDFs to Word, Excel and various other documents using this complimentary online tool. You then need to download it from the website. Unfortunately when we did this the give-and-take certificate we concluded upward with wasn't quite what we'd started with.

There are limits to this complimentary online version. For example, y'all can only perform 1 task per hour. If you want admission to more tools (there are 47 in total) y'all need to register and select a programme, the options are pay monthly and abolish at any time $6, pay yearly $48. There is also a i time lifetime license that comes with PDF Candy Desktop for $99 - but since the desktop app doesn't piece of work on Macs it'due south not actually relevant to Mac users.

Skim

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Skim is an open source, complimentary PDF reader, so as long as yous don't await more than basic functions you will exist satisfied.

The tool allows you to view PDFs, add notes, underlines and highlight text.

Skim is more for reading PDFs - it was designed for academics, so it's less near filling in and editing PDFs and more nearly the comfort of reading and navigating them along with the ability to add notes and bookmark pages. If all you want is a PDF reader this may well adjust you. You tin can download it here.

9.

FineReader Pro for Mac

ABBYY FineReader Pro

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This is the app to try if you desire OCR (optical character recognition) capabilities (although Preview does now offer these). However, we nearly didn't realise how deep the capabilities of this app went considering the results tin be a footling hit-and-miss. Actually, the capabilities of the 30-day complimentary trial version are pretty impressive, as long equally you lot are willing to accept that it might not e'er do a smashing job of translating what it 'sees'.

Nosotros discovered this when we imported our PDF and were greeted with a warning to "Delight re-scan your document at a college resolution". Given the PDF we were imported hadn't been scanned we were a niggling confused by this. Then when nosotros exported the 'scan' to Word we saw a warning that some of the pages had not been recognised. The resulting Word document (actually we opened information technology in Pages) was a little muddled, some of the translations were laughable. But the full general content had come through well plenty for us to be able to correct the mistakes.

Now, this probably wouldn't practice for you if you wanted to edit a straightforward PDF - if that's the case use one of the other apps. However, if you had scanned text from a book or a printout and y'all wanted to edit that so this is the app for y'all.

Every bit nosotros mentioned before, we had a scan we had taken with our iPhone camera via the Notes app and we were able to get FineReader to 'read' this and open information technology every bit a Give-and-take document, which we could then edit. Certain, there might be a few words that are incorrect, but it'due south got to be better than typing the whole thing out.

One time in Word (or Pages), y'all can edit the certificate as much as you like. We did see a alarm that fonts were missing, and there was a strange case of paragraph formatting that acquired the text to wrap to the next line every bit if it was in a box, but it was a good effort we thought.

As for collaboration and editing y'all have all the tools that are bachelor in the app you end upward opening the document in, be that Give-and-take, Pages, Excel, PowerPoint or something else.

It might non be spot on every fourth dimension, just the fact that we were able to scan a document and export information technology to Word where we could edit it, was a real bonus.