5 Best and Free Adobe Acrobat Alternatives to Choose in 2023

Adobe Acrobat remains one of the best solutions when it comes to creating, editing, and managing PDF documents. But sometimes you need a tool that will offer just a little bit extra, depending on the PDF document you are creating and your purposes for its creation.

For this reason, there are a lot of Adobe Acrobat alternatives in the market to choose from. We have analyzed as many as we could get our hands on and the following are our top recommendations.

5 of the Best Free Adobe Acrobat Alternatives

1. UPDF

UPDF is at a low cost, but highly functional PDF editor that has all the features you would find on Adobe Acrobat without the complex function. It is easy to use, combining all the editing, PDF reading, and annotating features you would need into a single powerful user interface that is easy to navigate. There are no limits on the size or the number of pages that your PDF can have and whatever function you need, UPDF provides a fast and reliable solution.

The following are some of the things that you can do with UPDF:

You can use it to edit PDF documents in various ways. You can add and remove text, modify the font and color of the text and even add and edit images.
It is also one of the best PDF readers in the market, allowing you to open and view PDFs. Powerful annotation features allow you to add highlight, underline text and even add notes and comments as you read.
It has an OCR feature to help you edit scanned PDFs.
You can fill PDF forms.
It is also one of the best ways to convert PDF documents to a variety of editable and searchable formats.

Video Tutorial on How to Edit a PDF File on Windows

2. Foxit PDF Editor

This PDF editor has been around for almost as long as Adobe Acrobat and is in very many ways similar. Its main advantage other than, it has very powerful PDF editing features, is the fact that it easily integrates with other apps and tools to create a very useful collaborative tool.

Unlike Adobe Acrobat, Foxit is also very easy to use. You can open any PDF document on the program and make as many changes to both the text and images on the document. It is also a powerful conversion tool that you can use to convert PDF documents to other editable formats.

adobe acrobat alternative - foxit pdf editor

Pros

It can be used to edit both text and images.
It has a very simple user interface.
It comes with a free trial.
It has numerous annotation features.

Cons

Foxit can be very expensive and the license is limited to one device.

3. Nitro PDF Pro

Another highly sophisticated PDF editor that you can use instead of Adobe Acrobat is Nitro PDF Pro. This is a PDF program that allows you to create, edit, combine, annotate and convert PDFs to other formats. But perhaps its most praised feature is its e-signature capabilities. It was one of the first PDF tools to allow users to create a valid and binding signature to PDF documents.

Nitro PDF also easily integrates with cloud storage and other tools to facilitate collaboration. Its powerful annotation features make it much easier for a team to work on the same document.

adobe acrobat pro alternative - nitro pdf pro

Pros

It can create PDF documents by simply opening a document in the program.
It can also be used to edit both the text and images on the document.
Integrates easily with Google Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox, and Box for easier collaboration.
It has e-signature capabilities.

Cons

It is only available for Windows.

4. PDF Reader Pro

PDF Reade Pro is a great simple alternative that you can use to not just open and read PDF documents but also has numerous features to edit PDFs in various ways. For instance, it has powerful annotation features that allow you to highlight text in the document, underline text and add comments and notes.

It also has e-signature features, allowing you to add a binding and valid signature to any section of the PDF document. It is also one of the best ways to combine multiple PDF documents into one, without losing the quality of the original documents and add a watermark and other security features to the document.

adobe acrobat alternative - pdf reader pro

Pros

It can be used to create and edit PDFs.
You can combine as many PDFs as you want into a single document.
The OCR function makes it easy to work with scanned documents.
It is a lightweight tool that doesn't require too much space on your computer.

Cons

The user interface can take a little getting used to.
Some of the features, particularly security features are only available on the premium version.

5. Smallpdf

Smallpdf is proof that you don't need to install any programs on your computer to create and edit PDF documents. This easy-to-use and free online solution can do everything Adobe Acrobat can do, but completely on your browser. You can use this online tool to create, edit, combine, merge and even convert PDFs to other formats, all without installing any programs on your computer.

And because it is deployed completely online, on a cloud-based platform, it presents unprecedented collaborative capabilities, allowing you to share the PDFs that you are working on widely and more easily.

Pros

It can be used to create and edit PDF documents.
It comes with an OCR feature that you can use to edit scanned PDFs.
It can convert PDF documents to several other formats.
Has e-signature capabilities.

Cons

Most advanced features are available on a paid subscription plan.
Users have reported that they have seen errors when converting files to other formats.

Comparison of 4 PDF Editors

	UPDF	Foxit	Nitro	Smallpdf
Price	US$39.99/Year US$59.99/Perpetual	US$79/Year	US$179.99/Perpetual	US$83.42/Year
Rating	4.9	4.5	4.6	4.2
Performance	Super High	Common	High	Common

Although Adobe Acrobat can be a great solution in some instances. Above are some very useful alternatives to choose from, but if you want a tool that goes above and beyond in terms of features UPDF is a natural choice.

Conclusion

Adobe Acrobat charges incredibly high fee that may not affordable for general users. However, UPDF is cost-effective editor, it only charges US39.99, 1/6 of that price of Adobe but with the same high performace features which is absolute friendly to users. Download it today, and enjoy your working time with UPDF!