What are some Best Free PDF Editors in 2022
Using a best free PDF editor tool online or desktop app you can easily edit and add text to PDF document also change images, add your own graphics and more.
Since its creation around the year 2008, the PDF format (Portable Document Format ) has been very useful for the creation and management of digital documents that could be used regardless of the platform or operating system without losing their properties. This feature made it quickly become a default standard for exchanging documents, especially on the Internet. Historically, the editing and manipulation of PDF documents was controlled by its creator, the company Adobe Systems, which with its Adobe Acrobat family of products dominated the editing and reading of this type of document. Let’s see the Best Free PDF Editors.
Over time, various competitors, both free and proprietary, emerged. However, these days it’s hard to find a truly free PDF editor that makes it easy to not only edit and add text, but also change images, add your own graphics, sign your name, or fill out forms.
use of the PDF editors
You should note that some of these free PDF editors work online in your web browser. In this case you just have to load the PDF file, modify it in the browser and save it directly on your PC. However, online editors differ from their desktop counterparts, mostly because functionality on the web is generally limited and because files are exposed to the internet. The latter implies taking extra security measures, both to protect your PC and the confidentiality of the file itself.
The best free PDF editors
>Due to the diversity of tools available for editing PDF documents, you will find some that only do a few things while others do things that the previous ones cannot do. That is why we recommend using several tools if one is not enough to achieve a complete edition. For example, one can help you edit images while the other will allow you to delete pages.
Microsoft Word: A Superior Option
Do not panic! We know that Microsoft Word is not free, but if you have versions of 2013 or newer, you will not need the programs that we suggest below. This is possible because this Microsoft Office tool has a built-in great PDF editor that will help you when needed. In this case, you will only have to open the PDF directly from Word and wait a few minutes until it is loaded in order to edit it and save it again. In case you want to convert a Word document directly to PDF, you will have to go to the “Save as” option and select the “PDF” extension, it’s that simple.
Sejda: One of the Best Free PDF Editors
The good
- It will allow you to upload PDF files from other websites
- Supports adding hyperlinks
- Includes a signature tool
- Allows you to insert blank pages into the PDF
- You can remove pages from the PDF
- Supports whitening parts of the page
- You can insert images and shapes into the PDF
The bad
- Only 3 PDF files can be edited every hour
- The PDF to be edited must have less than 200 pages
- The maximum size of the PDF should not exceed 50 MB
In its favor, Sejda PDF Editor has the quality of being one of the few best free PDF editors that does not leave watermarks on the content. In addition, it should be noted that this tool has 2 modes: one in which you can run it via the web and another version for desktop if you prefer it that way. It is necessary to know that there are differences between both versions. The desktop one supports a greater number of sources while the online one allows you to receive files via URL or has online storage services such as Dropbox, OneDrive and Google Drive.
A valued feature is Web Integration which allows PDF publishers to provide a link to their users to access online content with a simple click on the link. All articles are removed from the editor after 2 hours. Another advantage of the online editor is that it can work on any operating system since it only depends on the browser. While for Desktop versions there are versions available for Windows, macOS or Linux on their official website.
Inkscape: One of the Best Free PDF Editors
The good
- Supports graphics editing
- Wide arsenal of tools for editing images
The bad
- Excessive amount of tools to edit graphics
- You need knowledge of working with an image editor
If you’ve interacted with Inkscape before you’ll recognize it as a popular free vector image editor, but it actually offers much more. Its functions include editing PDF files.
The case of Inkscape is peculiar. If you have not been familiar with the use of image editors like Gimp or Adobe Photoshop it will be difficult for you to learn how to use an advanced tool like Inkscape.
In the list of the best free PDF editors, you should only consider using Inkscape if you just want to remove or edit the images or text in the PDF document. For form editing, we will recommend other tools in this selection. Ultimately you could add shapes in another tool and then edit the PDF entirely with Inkscape.
To obtain this tool you can always access its official page .
PDFescape Online: One of the Best Free PDF Editors
The good
- online availability
- Wide variety of editing tools
- Allows you to add custom text and images
- Can delete and add PDF pages
The bad
- The original document’s own text cannot be edited
- Limit PDF size and page length
One of the most robust free online PDF editors is PDFescape which will always be free as long as the edited file does not exceed 100 MB in size or 100 pages. Actually, with this editor you will not be able to change text or edit images with this editor, however, you can add your own text, images, links, or form fields.
On the other hand, the tool is very customizable and you can configure the size, font type, color, alignment and apply effects such as bold, underline and italics to your liking. You’ll also be able to draw on the PDF, add sticky notes, strikethrough text, put white space over anything you want to disappear, and insert lines, checkmarks, arrows, ovals, circles, rectangles, and comments. Other features include removing individual pages from the PDF, rotating pages, cropping parts of a page, rearranging page order, and adding more pages from other PDF files.
Like any good online editor, you will have the option of uploading the PDF file, configuring its URL address, as well as building and designing its structure. Once you have finished editing the document, you can download the resulting file to your computer. The most interesting thing about this process is that you don’t even need an account to do it, only if you want to store your progress tracking on the site.
Apart from the online version that is cross-platform and there is also a desktop version called PDFescape Desktop, but it is not free and only runs on Microsoft Windows 7 or later versions. You can get it by visiting PDFescape.com
PDF-XChange : One of the Best Free PDF Editors
The good
- Makes use of OCR to identify the text in the PDF
- You can import a variety of shapes and images
- Allows you to add QR codes to the PDF
- Portable version available
The bad
- License required for some features
- Compatible only with Windows
An interesting tool in the field of editing PDF files is PDF-XChange Editor, which has countless features in your favor, but not all of them you can use for free. In case you stick to using the free features you may be able to make some modifications and save it on your computer. On the other hand, if you use any of the paid functions, a watermark will appear on the PDF file.
Using this tool you can upload files from different sources such as a URL, SharePoint, Google Drive and Dropbox. In turn, you can save the resulting file in any of these cloud storage spaces.
A much appreciated feature in this PDF editor is the highlighting of all form fields so you can easily spot where you need to fill. If you’re editing a PDF where forms are plentiful, you’ll appreciate having this functionality at hand. Apart from adding your own text to the PDF, you can also add or delete pages from the document.
There are both desktop and portable versions, both for Windows 7, Windows 8 or Windows 10 that you can download from the following link. Download PDF-XChange Editor
LibreOffice Draw: One of the Best Free PDF Editors
The good
- Full document text editing
- Does not leave a watermark
- Wide variety of resources for editing.
The bad
- You must download the entire suite just to use the PDF editor
For users of Linux or free software in general, the LibreOffice office suite will not be alien to them, which has among its tools Draw, which is a tool for editing vector graphics and diagramming. However, among the many features of LibreOffice Draw is the editing of PDF files. To do this, just open in the File menu and then Open you can load the PDF document you want to edit.
Once the PDF document is opened, LibreOffice Draw will show all its potential in this field, giving us the possibility not only to edit, but also to create any element within a PDF. All this in an easy and intuitive way. You can modify images, headers, colors, fonts, etc. When saving the document, you must select the Export option to choose the PDF format.
Needless to say, LibreOffice is a multiplatform office suite that can be run without problems on Windows, Mac, and Linux. To get it, visit the download site .
PDFelement: One of the Best Free PDF Editors
The good
- Allows you to edit the PDF text directly
- Supports adding images, links and custom watermarks
- Background of PDF pages can be edited
- Headers and footers can be included in the PDF
- Supports combining multiple PDFs
- PDF pages can be cropped
- Support OCR
- You can insert, extract, delete and rotate PDF pages
- Editing embedded forms is easy
- You can password protect the PDF
The bad
- The free version places a watermark on the PDF
Finally, we selected PDFelement, a free and interesting editor, but with a limitation that can be somewhat inconvenient if we don’t get the paid version: It embeds a watermark in each of the pages of the PDF document that we edit.
However, you could still consider some contexts in which watermarks are not an inconvenience and take advantage of the benefits of this PDF editor, which, among others, supports editing any text within the PDF, adding images, links or passwords. You can merge multiple PDF or background edit the document pages.
Finally, mention that it is a multiplatform tool that can work correctly on various operating systems. Versions for Windows, Mac OS, Android, and iOS are available.
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