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Acrobat online services makes it easy to sign documents online. After uploading a PDF and signing in, complete form filling with text boxes, checkmarks, and more. To place your online signature, upload an image of your signature by clicking the Sign icon, then Add Signature. If you try to choose the tool that's not available in the free version of Acrobat Reader for Mac, the app will direct you to the website where you can subscribe to get access. All in all, while the paid Adobe Acrobat Reader for Mac offers you a full toolkit of productivity, its free option is comparable to Apple Preview, with the latter being.
In a digitized era, where practically all business is done online, it's hard to spend a day without encountering a PDF file. After all, it's the most popular digital document format — interactive, free to use and, crucially, able to preserve original formatting (including fonts, images, layouts, and more).
Developed by Adobe in the 90s, PDF made it possible to present identical documents using different applications and devices. Originally a proprietary invention that was promoted with Adobe software, PDF became an open format in 2008, which meant free use for all, without any lingering ties to Adobe.
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How To Choose The Best PDF Editor For Mac
Today, there are dozens of applications that can read, modify, and edit PDFs. All are different: free PDF editors, PDF modifiers, costly Mac PDF editors, and even a default PDF reader for Mac that comes with your operating system.
If you need to edit a PDF on Mac, it's important to not go straight to Google looking for a 'free PDF editor download.' In the last decade, lots of bad players have been putting all kinds of malware in those free PDF downloads, hoping for people to be enticed enough by the proposition. So you should know exactly which PDF editor app is best for your needs — luckily you have the perfect guide below.
Apple Preview PDF reader for Mac
If you're looking for a free PDF editor for Mac, you should start with the one you already have — Preview — which is the default application for viewing any images and PDF files.
Although it can hardly be called a PDF editor app, Preview can perform most of the tasks most people need to do every day: looking through the documents, leaving comments, and signing contracts.
To configure Preview to your liking:
- Launch the app from your Dock or Launchpad
- Select View from the menu bar options
- Set scroll, zoom, and toolbar to what you'd like to see
Then to actually use PDF modifier functions:
- Choose Tools from the menu bar
- Hover over Annotate
- Select from shapes, signatures, notes (comments), and more
When you're done editing the document, don't forget to save it (⌘ + S) or export it to create a new file by going to File ➙ Export.
A hidden benefit of Preview that's not often talked about is its natural integration into the macOS. The app can be easily used within the Apple ecosystem and is quite swift as well.
Adobe Acrobat Reader for Mac
- Launch the app from your Dock or Launchpad
- Select View from the menu bar options
- Set scroll, zoom, and toolbar to what you'd like to see
Then to actually use PDF modifier functions:
- Choose Tools from the menu bar
- Hover over Annotate
- Select from shapes, signatures, notes (comments), and more
When you're done editing the document, don't forget to save it (⌘ + S) or export it to create a new file by going to File ➙ Export.
A hidden benefit of Preview that's not often talked about is its natural integration into the macOS. The app can be easily used within the Apple ecosystem and is quite swift as well.
Adobe Acrobat Reader for Mac
One of the first and hence now widely considered standard solutions for viewing and editing PDF files is Adobe Acrobat Reader. By all accounts, it's a solid and professional PDF editor for Mac.
There's, however, one caveat — you can hardly call Adobe Acrobat the best free PDF editor for Mac because to get all of its features you need to pay, a lot. If you subscribe for the whole year, it comes down to $15 a month. Otherwise, it's $25.
So if you download Adobe Reader for Mac from Adobe's website, it will only give you a limited number of tools, which are very similar to Apple Preview: comment and sign. To get more you'd need to sign up for the Adobe Acrobat Pro free trial.
Anyway, in case you're satisfied with Acrobat PDF editor's limited functionality for the basic version, you can still work with all the PDFs you need:
- Download and install Adobe Reader for Mac from adobe.com
- Open the PDF file of your choice
- To comment or sign the file, navigate to Tools in the top bar of the app
- Choose the tool you want to use and then select a more specific one from the top bar once you're in the document itself
If you try to choose the tool that's not available in the free version of Acrobat Reader for Mac, the app will direct you to the website where you can subscribe to get access.
All in all, while the paid Adobe Acrobat Reader for Mac offers you a full toolkit of productivity, its free option is comparable to Apple Preview, with the latter being a bit more lightweight and fast due to its integration with macOS.
But what's a truly powerful Mac PDF editor?
PDFpen full-featured OCR editor
While the paid version of Adobe Acrobat Reader for Mac is costly and convoluted, PDFpen offers much more in one straightforward package.
Install PDFpen, best PDF editor for Mac
Make any PDF file editable with PDFpen. With in-built OCR support, nothing is carved in stone if you have PDFpen installed on your Mac.
PDFpen lets you edit PDFs by adding text and images, fixing typos, filling out forms, and covering sensitive information. What's more, the app features an OCR (optical character recognition) functionality, so you can scan printed documents directly into editable PDF files, and even export them to Microsoft Word later on.
Using PDFpen is as easy as Preview:
- Open any PDF document
- In the top bar, find the toggle which lets you switch between text and shapes. These are the tools you can use to enhance your documents. All of them can also be accessed from the Tools dropdown in the menu bar.
One of the most commonly used features with PDFs is highlighting, which is perfectly executed in PDFpen. Just select from the top bar and choose a color. The tool will then switch between a freehand highlighter when hovering over shapes and a structured one when it's over some text.
How to edit excel sheet on mac. Finally, PDFpen's renowned OCR functionality doesn't require you to have any specific AI knowledge — it just works:
- In PDFpen, go File ➙ Open (or ⌘ + O) and select your image
- Check all languages that apply
- Turn the image into either an OCR Page or OCR document
- Now you can edit your image freely and export it later
Bonus: Professional PDF Search
When you're working with lots of PDFs everyday, some things are inevitably going to get lost. Especially, since lots of documents and reports are often dozens or even hundreds of pages long.
In this reality, you absolutely need a tool that will help you retain information at the tip of your fingers. Enter PDF Search. This app doesn't just search your PDF files for exact matches — it uses the power of AI to check relevant terms, multiple combinations, and even scan PDF files in bulk.
The first time you open PDF Search, it will ask you to index the folder with all your PDFs, which may take some time but will also speed up all future searches. After indexing is complete, simply enter the number or text you're looking for in the search field, press Return, and the results (including related ones) would instantly appear.
To recap, when you're looking for the best free PDF editor for Mac, your options might seem infinite, but it really comes down to what exactly you need to edit. If it's just viewing documents and making comments, Apple Preview can do the job just fine. But when you need some heavy-duty lifting, nothing beats PDFpen. In addition, PDF Search is recommended for anyone working with large number of PDFs on a daily basis.
Best of all, PDFpen and PDF Search are both available to you on a free 7-day trial from Setapp, a platform for over 200 indispensable Mac apps designed to take your productivity to the next level. All that's left to do now is just read and edit!
Meantime, prepare for all the awesome things you can do with Setapp.
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With Adobe Acrobat, users can create, view, and edit any PDF files without any hassle. However, in spite of its features and effectiveness, not all users can afford to have this tool since it costs hundreds of dollars. And it's quite complicated for beginners. In this case, many users are looking for some simple and cheaper alternatives to Acrobat. There are bunches of PDF editing software on the internet today, and to help you out some of the finest Adobe Acrobat substitute are shown after the cut.
Adobe Acrobat Writer Professional 11
Top Adobe Acrobat Replacement
ApowerPDF
This is a PDF editor software that can be used in creating or modifying any existing PDF files and forms. ApowerPDF features all of the must-have functions that a PDF editor must have. These includes the ability to manage PDF pages whether you need to delete, extract, crop, or rotate a specific portion of a PDF document.
Plus, it provides security by allowing users to add passwords and signatures to a certain PDF file. And if you need to convert a PDF document into an editable format, then this tool can help you to convert your file into editable formats like Word, PowerPoint, and Excel.
This program can be a great Adobe Acrobat alternative due to the fact that it is compact and provides most of the functions that can be done on Acrobat. It is definitely one worth checking out.
PDFescape Desktop
Another substitute to Adobe Acrobat that you can utilize is a program called PDFescape Desktop. This application mimics some of the functions that can be found on Acrobat such as the ability to adjust, delete, insert, and crop PDF pages. It also supports encryption of PDF contents with the use of a password, modifies PDF information tag, and allows the use of scanned signature to sign PDF files.
This is a decent tool to use as a replacement for doing some basic modifications into your PDF file. And the desktop version of this app requires a premium account so it means you need to avail their service before you can utilize it.
Foxit Phantom PDF
The next alternative to Adobe Acrobat is called Foxit Phantom PDF. Unlike the usual PDF converters, this tool is equipped with easy to use editing functions which can be used to crop, add watermarks, cut, rotate, resize, etc. It also supports OCR technology and font recognition which is very useful in modifying or starting a new PDF document. You need to spend a little bit to get this program but it's worth giving a try.
Anyone can use this as an alternative to Adobe's PDF editor for it offers similar if not the same function as the Acrobat. Just be aware that this tool can't save into few formats, which the developer needs to address.
Mac Preview
Now if you are a Mac OS user, then a program similar to Adobe Acrobat that you can use is Preview. This PDF editor is made for Mac OS users' convenience and is capable of editing as well as creating new PDF documents. By using this program, you can modify multiple portion of a PDF text, at the same time trim, and label multiple pages together. All of its functions are quick and easy to utilize making it a fair alternative to Acrobat.
With its attributes it surely fits in as one of the must have free alternative for Adobe Acrobat. And this application is for free, but it only runs on OSX devices.
PDFPen
This next PDF editor for Mac OS is named PDFPen. It has the basic features that a PDF editor has, including modifications in typos in the text documents, capable of adding texts, images, and signatures. Aside from these, PDFPen even supports OCR technology helping users in converting images into an editable text document.
It is easy to say that this tool can be a good choice as an Acrobat alternative. But note that it's exclusive for Mac users only.
Adobe Writer Free Download
Those are the finest Adobe Acrobat replacement that you can use on a daily basis. You might notice that most of them have similar functions, but some programs have additional functions than the others. Feel free to try all of the alternative programs that we provide above to know which app suits your needs.