Adobe Acrobat Reader — The Complete Guide: What You Can Do Free and What Needs a Subscription
Acrobat Reader is the PDF reader from Adobe, the company that created the format. It displays even complex documents with forms, layers and digital signatures faithfully, so it serves as the reference when a file looks different in different programs. It runs on Windows and macOS, on mobile and in the browser.
Adobe Acrobat Reader
Adobe Inc.
The standard PDF reader: view, comment, fill forms and sign; the advanced Acrobat online tools are limited to about one use per month.
Get it from the vendorWhat you get
- Faithful display — forms, layers and signatures as the author intended.
- Comments — markups, notes and highlights for reviewing drawings and specifications.
- Fill and sign — completing forms and signing contracts and approvals.
- Sharing — sending a document for review and collecting comments.
- Online tools — convert, compress, merge, edit and OCR in the browser, with limits.
What is free and what is not
Viewing, commenting, filling and signing in Reader are free; it cannot edit text or images. For the online tools, most allow one transaction without signing in; with a free Adobe ID the premium tools are limited to one transaction per rolling 30 days, usually up to 100 MB per file. Unlimited use needs a paid Acrobat subscription, and online work uploads files to Adobe’s cloud.
Related tools
For a light free reader with comments and signing — Foxit PDF Reader. For an open-source reader with annotations — Okular. For converting, compressing and merging without a task quota — PDF24.
Foxit PDF Reader
Foxit Software
Fast free PDF reader with comments, form filling and signing — a lighter alternative to Acrobat Reader, without text editing.
Get it from the vendor
Okular
KDE
KDE’s document viewer — read and annotate PDFs with highlights and notes, and verify digital signatures.
Get it from the vendor
PDF24 Creator / PDF24 Tools
Geek Software GmbH
Free PDF toolbox: an offline Windows program plus a browser version — merge, split, compress, OCR, convert and a PDF printer.
Get it from the vendorPDFgear
PDFgear
Free PDF editor with no sign-up and no watermark: edit existing text, OCR, convert, merge and sign.
Get it from the vendorThe bottom line
Acrobat Reader is a dependable reader for review and signing. For everyday file work — merging, converting and compressing — a free tool without quotas is the better choice.