How to Create & Fill Forms in PDFs on Mac

No more filling out printed forms and scanning them to share with others. UPDF has solved this problem with its Ultimate Form Solution. You can now create, edit, fill, and even sign forms directly in the UPDF app for Mac.

All the features you need, such as text fields, checkboxes, dropdown menus, form field recognition, and more, are available. Creating one form and making multiple copies with options to customize according to your needs has never been easier.

This comprehensive step-by-step guide will teach you how to create, edit, and fill out forms in any PDF document. Alternatively, you can watch the video guide below to learn more about these features.

If you still do not have UPDF on Mac, you can click the below button or go to the App Store to download UPDF.

And you can upgrade to the pro version at a very low price now.

1. How to Create Fillable PDF Forms from Scratch on Mac

You can easily create different fillable forms and adjust them as necessary by following the steps below:

Step 1. Click on the "File" > "Create" > "Blank page", rename, choose how many pages you need, select the paper style, then, click on the "Create" to create one blank PDF.

Step 2. Now, you can click the Prepare Form mode. You can see a list of options which are as follows.

Text Field

Click on this button and draw it on the place where you want to add. You can easily add a text field/box anywhere on the PDF document where you want the form filler to enter information.

You can click to select it. Here, you can increase or decrease the text box size by dragging the side of the box and change the position by dragging and dropping.

Moreover, you can double-click on the text field to change its properties. Here you can change its general information like name, tooltip, default value, etc, its style, and actions if needed.

Check Box

If need to select one or more options from a question, you can add check box to PDF forms. Just click on the "Check Box". Draw to add it to the PDF. Same as text field, you can also change its position, size, and properties.

Radio Button

When you need to select only one option from a group of options, you can use the Radio Button.

To create one group of radio buttons, you need to make sure the names for the different radio buttons are the same and sort the Rado Choice like "Choice1", "Choice2", and "Choice3"... for each radio button.

Dropdown

With this option, you can create a dropdown menu in the form from which your fillers can select the most appropriate option. You can change its properties by adding a name, add tooltip, add the selectable items, allow user to enter custom text, and more.

List Box

The list box allows you to list out all the options and select one or more options from it. You can also customize it properties like name, tooltip, items, multiple selections and more.

A Button

You can use this OK button if you want any button added to your form that does a specific action. You can choose the layout for the button like "Label Only", "icon only", "Label over icon", and more. Then, enter the label text and select the icon if needed to create the button.

If you need to create an action button, you can click on the "Actions", select the trigger, action and add an action to it.

Image Field

You can also add an image field to let others update the image here. What you need to do is click on the "Image Field" icon, draw to add the image field, and customize the properties if needed.

Date Field

To add a date field to the PDF, click on the "Date Field", and draw to add a date field to the PDF. You can go to "Style" to change its date styles like its format, appearance, alignment, etc.

Digital Signature

You can also add a digital signature field to get it signed. Click on the "Digital Signature", draw to add, and customize its properties.

Step 3. When you finish customizing the PDF forms, you can go to "Preview" to check if the PDF form works well for you.

Step 4. Save the PDF form by clicking on the "File" > "Save".

2. Create PDF Fillable PDF Forms Automatically

When you have one non-fillable PDF form and want to make it fillable in one click, you can use UPDF's Form Filed Recognition to do it. Here is the guide.

Step 1. Open the PDF form with UPDF on Mac. Navigate to "Prepare Form" > "Toolkit" icon > "Form Field Recognition". Click on it, and UPDF will analyze the PDF form and convert your nonfillable PDF forms into fillable ones.

Step 2. You can click on "File" > "Save" to save your fillable PDF forms.

3. How to Fill Forms in PDF Documents

After creating the forms, you can fill them out on your own or ask others to fille out them. You can use UPDF on Mac to fill out them easily. Here is the guide.

• You need to switch to the Reader, Comment, or Edit PDF mode to fill in the form.
• Select any highlighted boxes, as shown below, and start filling.

• If the selected area or field is a text field, you can add text.
• Similarly, the checkboxes and radio buttons will fill up when you click them.
• The dropdown menus will work as intended, so you can see different options and select as needed.
• Select the Save option once you make all the necessary changes or choose Save As to save it in another format or file.

4. Tips to Create and Fill Your Fillable PDF Forms

UPDF for Mac has more than the features mentioned above. We will list all the tips with some excellent features to help you create and fill PDF forms better.

Duplicate Across Pages

If you need to duplicate the fields in one page to several pages, you can choose the textbox, field, etc., select the "Duplicate Across Pages" option, choose the pages you want to duplicate the elements and apply it by clicking "OK". Save the document to save all the changes you have made.

Create Multiple Form Copies

After you have added one field like a dropdown menu or a checkbox, you can use the "Create Multiple Copies" to duplicate them. Just select the field you need to create copies, click on "Create Multiple Copies", enter the numbers of fields you want to have, and customize other settings, click on "OK".

Align Fields

You can change the alignment of your forms or elements using this feature, like aligning in six different directions or changing distributions. You only need to select all the fields by holding on the "CMD" keyboard plus clicking, then, click on the "Align" and select the option you need.

Clear Form

If your forms are fillable with wrong contents and want to clear them all, you can open the form with UPDF and click on "Clear Form" in UPDF to clear them in one click.

Import and Export Data

To import and export data, you can go to "Prepare form" > "Toolkit" icon > "Import Data" or "Export Data".

Hope you can create and fill your fillable PDF forms with no effort with this guide.