Is there a free alternative to Adobe Acrobat?

Yes — the tools built into your computer cost nothing, and several web tools have real free tiers. The trade-offs are in the table above: metered usage, uploads, or missing features rather than money.

Adobe Acrobat alternatives for filling in and signing PDFs

Prices and features checked 20 September 2026

Acrobat is worth its price if you edit PDFs for a living. If you mostly fill in forms and sign them, you are paying £15–£25 a month for a fraction of what you bought.

These are the realistic alternatives, including the free tools already on your computer. Each entry says what it gives up relative to Acrobat.

Feature by feature
Feature	PDFpad	Sejda	Preview (macOS)	iLovePDF	DocHub	Microsoft Edge PDF reader	pdfFiller
Type on a flat (non-form) PDF	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Partly	Yes
Fill existing form fields	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Typed signature	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Paid only
Drawn signature (touch/mouse)	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Paid only
Upload signature image	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Paid only
Save and reuse signature	Yes	Yes	Yes	Paid only	Yes	No	Paid only
Date and tick fields	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Paid only
Flatten so fills can't be moved	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Partly	No	Paid only
Save as PDF	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Paid only
Save as Word (DOCX)	Paid only	Paid only	No	Paid only	Partly	No	Paid only
Reorder / delete / merge pages	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Paid only
Works on a phone browser	Yes	Partly	No	Yes	Yes	Partly	Yes
File never uploaded	Yes	Partly	Yes	No	No	Yes	No
No watermark on free tier	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
No account needed to start	Yes	Yes	Yes	Partly	No	Yes	No

Pricing, as published by each vendor
Tool	Free tier	Paid	Billing
PDFpadChecked 20 Sept 2026	Unlimited filling and signing; 3 PDF exports per 30 days, each with a small footer line	£6 a month, £39 a year, or £2 to unlock one document for 24 hours	Monthly or annualOne click from the account page, any time
SejdaChecked 20 Sept 2026	"No signup required. Limited usage and features" — with "Page and hourly limits", "Limited file uploads" and tool-specific caps	Web Week Pass "£5 per user for 7 days"; Desktop+Web Annual "£63 per user per year"; a monthly web plan is also listed	Monthly or annual
Preview (macOS)Checked 20 Sept 2026	Free — built into macOS	—	—
iLovePDFChecked 20 Sept 2026	Free tier with per-tool monthly caps — most tools allow 1 document a month, merge allows 25	Premium "9GBP / month", or "60GBP Billed annually"	Monthly or annual
DocHubChecked 20 Sept 2026	€0/month, with all core features sharing a limit of "3 uses/mo"	Basic €8/month and Pro €12/month, with "Billed Yearly Save 25%"	Monthly or annualDocHub states you can cancel during the 30-day Pro trial "without any obligations"
Microsoft Edge PDF readerChecked 20 Sept 2026	Free — built into Windows	—	—
pdfFillerChecked 20 Sept 2026	Trial only — the editor is behind a subscription after it	Basic "$8 per user/month", Enhanced "$12 per user/month" and Premium "$15 per user/month" on an annual commitment	Monthly or annual

What each vendor says

Sejda

Sejda is the only paid tool here that sells a one-week pass — £5 for seven days — which suits a single urgent document. [source]
The desktop application processes files on your own machine; the web version uploads them. The annual plan covers both. [source]
The monthly web price is rendered in a way we could not read reliably on the last check, so it is not quoted here. [source]

Preview (macOS)

Apple documents the workaround for flat forms: "If a PDF won't allow you to type directly into the form, you can add a text box instead." [source]
Signatures can be captured with the trackpad, the camera or an iPhone, and sync across Macs through iCloud Drive — the best signature experience of any built-in tool. [source]
Preview is Mac-only, so the same document on a phone or a Windows machine needs something else. [source]

iLovePDF

The free tier is metered per tool: iLovePDF lists a limit of one document a month on most tools, with larger allowances on merge. [source]
Premium is listed at 9GBP a month or 60GBP billed annually for 1–25 users. [source]
Every tool works by uploading the file to iLovePDF's servers and downloading the result. [source]

DocHub

The free plan is genuinely usable but capped: "All features share a monthly limit of 3 uses." [source]
DocHub edits existing text in a PDF, which most tools at this price do not. [source]
Files are uploaded and stored in a DocHub account, with Google Drive integration as the main workflow. [source]

Microsoft Edge PDF reader

Microsoft describes the inking tools as letting you "take notes, fill out and sign PDF forms" — the signature is whatever you can draw with a mouse or trackpad, and there is no way to save it for next time. [source]
Microsoft's own documentation is explicit about the limit: "You can view and print the PDF in the reader, but you can't edit its contents." [source]
Ink and text notes are saved as annotations, so a recipient with a PDF editor can select and delete them. [source]

pdfFiller

pdfFiller publishes its individual plans at $8, $12 and $15 per user per month on an annual commitment; month-to-month costs more. [source]
Documents are stored in a pdfFiller account by design — the product is a document workspace, not a local editor. [source]

Questions

Is there a free alternative to Adobe Acrobat?: Yes — the tools built into your computer cost nothing, and several web tools have real free tiers. The trade-offs are in the table above: metered usage, uploads, or missing features rather than money.

Try it on your PDF

Open your document, fill it in, sign it and save. Nothing is uploaded, and you don’t need an account to start.

or drop a file here · nothing is uploaded

PDFpad vs Adobe Acrobat

Competitor names are used descriptively to identify their products. Every price and feature above was read from the vendor's own page on the date shown and is re-checked quarterly. If something here is out of date or wrong, tell us and we will correct it.