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Edit a PDF

A PDF is a description of a printed page, not a document you can freely type into. Editing one means deciding how much fidelity you are willing to give up to change something.

85 tools here do less than the name of this job suggests, and each one's profile says what it actually does. That sentence is on the profile rather than repeated on every row.

85 options · Sources read 18 October 2026 · Whether a tool changes existing text or only adds a layer is documented by each vendor and recorded on the profiles. We have not edited the same document in every tool here.

What it takes, and what it produces
In: a PDF. Out: a PDF, carrying annotations, filled fields or changed content depending on the tool.
What limits it
Rarely published. The thing to watch is what the output keeps, because annotating, filling a field and changing text that is already on the page are three different operations and the rows say which each tool does.

Edit tools: controls, file handling and cost

These are different ways to do the same job. The order does not indicate quality, and where we have not checked something the row says so rather than guessing.

85
tools handle this job
42
keep the file on your device
Observed by us, or no server anywhere in the path. Of the other 43: 9 upload your file; 29 process some versions on your device and run others on a server; 3 are documented as staying local but have not been tested; 2 run on a server you provide.
37
remove redacted content
Verified as removing it rather than covering it. Of the other 48: 4 cover the content instead of removing it; 10 have no recorded finding either way; 34 have no redaction feature at all.

85 tools for editing

Ordered by relevance to this job, not by payment. Our overall ranking is in the full index.

  • Adobe Acrobat
    Price Free · £14.99/mo
    Licence Not verified
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • PDF-XChange Editor
    Price Free · £48.00 once
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Not checked
  • Apryse
    Price from £1,112.55/yr
    Licence Proprietary commercial
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • Aspose.PDF
    Price from £889.30 once
    Licence Proprietary commercial
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • Foxit PDF Editor
    Price from £8.15/mo
    Licence Not verified
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • iText
    Price Free tier
    Licence Dual-licensed per…
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • IronPDF
    Price from £740.96 once
    Licence Proprietary commercial
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • No Fuss PDF
    Price Free
    Licence No licence or terms page…
    Your files Stays on device
    Redaction No feature
  • PDF Expert
    Price Free · £72.99/yr
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • PDF Studio
    Price Not verified
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • Syncfusion PDF
    Price from £889.30/yr
    Licence Proprietary commercial
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • Power PDF
    Price from £95.00 once
    Licence proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Not checked
  • Adobe PDF Library
    Price from £4,489.17/yr
    Licence Commercial
    Your files No server
    Redaction Not checked
  • Apache PDFBox
    Price Open source
    Licence Apache-2.0
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • DocHub
    Price Free · £5.93/mo
    Licence Not verified
    Your files Uploads - claimed
    Redaction Covers, not removes
  • Foxit PDF SDK
    Price Not verified
    Licence Commercial
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • Master PDF Editor
    Price from £59.30 once
    Licence proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • Nitro PDF Pro
    Price Not verified
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • Nutrient
    Price Not verified
    Licence Proprietary commercial
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • PDF Architect
    Price Free · £94.00/yr
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • PDFgear
    Price Free
    Licence Proprietary freeware
    Your files On device - claimed
    Redaction Not checked
  • PyMuPDF
    Price Open source
    Licence AGPL-3.0 or commercial
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • Stirling PDF
    Price Free · £73.43/mo
    Licence Open-core
    Your files Your own instance
    Redaction Removes content

    Our pick 1: Run it yourself and nothing leaves your network. Redaction deletes the matching text without flattening the page - we tested that on our own instance.

  • Wondershare PDFelement
    Price Free · £59.33/yr
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • Xodo
    Price Free · £6.05/mo
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • Bluebeam Revu
    Price from £264.00/yr
    Licence proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • pdfcpu
    Price Open source
    Licence Apache-2.0
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature

    Our pick 5: A Go library and CLI for validation, encryption and assembly. Local, and honest enough to say its PDF 2.0 validation is basic.

  • ABBYY FineReader PDF
    Price from £84.00/yr
    Licence Not verified
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • GroupDocs
    Price from £897.24 once
    Licence Commercial
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • JPedal
    Price from £710.90 once
    Licence Commercial: one-off…
    Your files No server
    Redaction Not checked
  • LEADTOOLS PDF SDK
    Price Not verified
    Licence Commercial
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • MuPDF.js
    Price Open source
    Licence AGPL-3.0-or-later or…
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • PDF Candy
    Price Free · £4.00/mo
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Covers, not removes
  • pdf-lib
    Price Open source
    Licence MIT
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • pikepdf
    Price Open source
    Licence MPL-2.0 for pikepdf
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature

    Our pick 4: Local Python around qpdf, and the project whose own documentation says programmatic redaction cannot be reliable. That warning is the most useful sentence in this index.

  • Sejda
    Price Free · £5.00 once
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Covers, not removes
  • Soda PDF
    Price Not verified
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • PDFsharp
    Price Open source
    Licence AGPL-3.0-only or…
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • PrizmDoc
    Price Not verified
    Licence Commercial
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • PDF-XChange Core API SDK
    Price Not verified
    Licence Commercial
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • Telerik Document Processing Libraries
    Price Not verified
    Licence Commercial
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • PDF Arranger
    Price Open source
    Licence GPL-3.0-or-later
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • pdfRest
    Price Free · £7.48/mo
    Licence Commercial
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • Pdftools PDF Viewer SDK
    Price Not verified
    Licence Commercial
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • Spire.PDF

    We could not check.

    Price Not verified
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • pdftk-java
    Price Open source
    Licence GPL-2.0-or-later for the…
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • Apple Preview
    Price Free
    Licence Not verified
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • SimplePDF
    Price Free tier
    Licence No software licence is…
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction No feature
  • CamScanner
    Price Free · £4.99/wk
    Licence Not verified
    Your files Uploads - claimed
    Redaction No feature
  • Gotenberg
    Price Open source
    Licence MIT
    Your files Your own instance
    Redaction No feature
  • LibreOffice Draw
    Price Open source
    Licence MPL-2.0
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • Microsoft Edge PDF reader
    Price Free
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction No feature
  • PandaDoc

    We could not check.

    Price Free tier
    Licence Proprietary hosted SaaS
    Your files Uploads - claimed
    Redaction No feature
  • PDFsam
    Price Free · £29.00/yr
    Licence PDFsam Basic is free…
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content

    Our pick 3: Desktop splitting and merging with no upload, and a policy that states plainly that no PDF content is sent to their servers.

  • Qoppa Java PDF SDK
    Price Not verified
    Licence Commercial per-library…
    Your files No server
    Redaction Not checked
  • SignNow
    Price Not verified
    Licence Proprietary hosted SaaS
    Your files Uploads - claimed
    Redaction No feature
  • Smallpdf
    Price Free · £6.75/mo
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • SnackPDF Ours
    Price Free
    Licence AGPL-3.0
    Your files Stays on device
    Redaction Removes content
  • Xournal++
    Price Open source
    Licence GPL-2.0
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • MuPDF (mutool)
    Price Open source
    Licence AGPL-3.0-or-later or…
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • PDF2Go
    Price Free · £6.85/mo
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • SwiftScan
    Price Free · £5.99/mo
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files On device - claimed
    Redaction Not checked
  • AvePDF
    Price Free · £51.00/yr
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Uploads - claimed
    Redaction Removes content
  • DocuSeal
    Price Open source
    Licence AGPL-3.0 with Section 7
    Your files Uploads - claimed
    Redaction No feature

    Our pick 8: Self-hosted e-signing, open source, so the documents stay on your own infrastructure.

  • iLovePDF
    Price Free · £5.00/mo
    Licence Not verified
    Your files Uploads - claimed
    Redaction Covers, not removes
  • PDF24
    Price Free
    Licence Freeware
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Removes content
  • Google Chrome built-in PDF viewer
    Price Free
    Licence Not verified
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction No feature
  • CommonLook PDF
    Price Not verified
    Licence Proprietary commercial…
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction No feature
  • PDFescape
    Price Free · £4.44/mo
    Licence Proprietary freeware
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction Not checked
  • pdfToolbox

    Responded with HTTP 503.

    Price Not verified
    Licence Commercial
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction No feature
  • pypdf
    Price Open source
    Licence BSD-3-Clause
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • SignWell
    Price Free tier
    Licence Proprietary hosted…
    Your files Uploads - claimed
    Redaction No feature
  • axesPDF
    Price from £482.11/yr
    Licence Proprietary subscription
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • borb
    Price Free · £214.00/yr
    Licence Dual-licensed
    Your files No server
    Redaction Not checked
  • PDFix
    Price Not verified
    Licence Proprietary commercial…
    Your files No server
    Redaction Removes content
  • SumatraPDF
    Price Open source
    Licence GPL-3.0
    Your files No server
    Redaction Not checked

    Our pick 7: Free, open source, no subscription and no bundled software. The reader to install when you want nothing else installed.

  • gImageReader
    Price Open source
    Licence GPL-3.0
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • Microsoft OneDrive document scanning
    Price Free
    Licence Proprietary Microsoft…
    Your files Uploads - claimed
    Redaction No feature
  • Okular
    Price Open source
    Licence GPL-2.0-or-later
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature

    Our pick 6: A KDE viewer with native PDF annotations and a GPLv2+ licence, so the marks travel inside the document.

  • PDF.js
    Price Open source
    Licence Apache-2.0
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • veraPDF
    Price Open source
    Licence Dual-licensed…
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature

    Our pick 9: Free PDF/UA validation under a dual licence, backed by a consortium rather than a single vendor.

  • Goodnotes
    Price Free · £11.99/yr
    Licence proprietary
    Your files On device - claimed
    Redaction No feature
  • ICEpdf
    Price Open source
    Licence Apache-2.0
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature
  • Notability
    Price Free tier
    Licence Proprietary
    Your files Mixed
    Redaction No feature
  • PDFium
    Price Open source
    Licence BSD-3-Clause for PDFium…
    Your files No server
    Redaction No feature

Choosing between them

Every listing here is a real product with a real website, checked for whether it is still working. Nothing on this page is paid for and no placement can be bought. Where we have not verified something, the row says so rather than guessing.

Choosing between adding to the page and changing it

  • Adding to the page or changing it

    Many tools draw text and shapes on top of the page. That is genuinely useful and it is not the same as editing, because the original text is still underneath and the new text is a separate layer.

  • Whether the output stays editable

    Flattening bakes everything into the page so nothing can be changed afterwards. It is the safer output to send and the wrong one if somebody has to correct it.

  • What the free tier adds

    Watermarks and page limits are the usual difference. Worth checking before you have done the work rather than after.

Check the result

Sources and scope

Every fact on this page comes from a vendor's own page. Each profile records the URL we read, the date, and the SHA-256 of the text, so a reader can check the bytes.

Found a changed feature or an incorrect detail? Report a correction.