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QPDF VS PDF-XChange Editor

Compare QPDF VS PDF-XChange Editor and see what are their differences

DocRaptor
As the only API powered by the Prince HTML-to-PDF engine, DocRaptor provides the best support for complex PDFs with powerful support for headers, page breaks, page numbers, flexbox, watermarks, accessible PDFs, and much more featured
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QPDF logo QPDF

QPDF is a command-line program that does structural, content-preserving transformations on PDF...

PDF-XChange Editor logo PDF-XChange Editor

The smallest, fastest, most feature-rich PDF editor/viewer available
  • QPDF Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-01-16
  • PDF-XChange Editor Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-08-03

QPDF features and specs

  • Open Source
    QPDF is an open-source project, allowing users to access, modify, and distribute the source code freely under the Apache License. This transparency can be an advantage for developers who need to integrate PDF features into their applications.
  • PDF Transformation
    QPDF offers robust functionality for transforming PDFs such as splitting, merging, and rotating, which can be crucial for users needing to manipulate PDF documents extensively.
  • Encryption and Decryption
    The tool provides strong support for encrypting and decrypting PDFs. This feature is valuable for users who need to protect sensitive information within PDF files.
  • Content Preservation
    QPDF focuses on retaining the original content and structure of a document even after transformations, ensuring that the integrity of the data is preserved.
  • Command-line Interface
    The tool's command-line interface makes it suitable for automated processing scripts and batch operations, which is helpful for advanced users and system administrators.

Possible disadvantages of QPDF

  • Complexity
    For users who are not familiar with command-line tools, QPDF can have a steep learning curve, making it less accessible to non-technical users.
  • Limited GUI
    QPDF lacks a graphical user interface, which may limit its usability for users who prefer visual interactions over command-line inputs.
  • Specific Use Case
    QPDF is mainly focused on serving developers and advanced users who need detailed PDF manipulations and may not provide the comprehensive feature set available in fully-fledged PDF editing applications.
  • Documentation Depth
    While QPDF provides documentation, it may not be exhaustive for all use cases, potentially requiring users to experiment or seek community assistance for complex tasks.
  • Dependency on Other Tools
    Certain transformations might require additional tools to perform tasks that go beyond QPDF’s capabilities, potentially complicating its use when a comprehensive solution is needed.

PDF-XChange Editor features and specs

  • Feature-Rich
    PDF-XChange Editor offers a wide range of features including annotation tools, OCR, content editing, and more. This makes it a comprehensive solution for managing PDF documents.
  • Lightweight
    The application is relatively lightweight and performs efficiently even on less powerful systems, providing a smooth user experience.
  • User Interface
    The interface is intuitive and user-friendly, making it easy to navigate through various functions and features.
  • OCR Support
    PDF-XChange Editor includes robust Optical Character Recognition (OCR) capabilities, allowing users to convert scanned documents into editable and searchable text.
  • Customization
    It offers a high level of customization, allowing users to tailor the toolbars, menus, and other interface elements to meet their specific needs.
  • Cost-Effective
    The software provides a good balance of features and cost, making it an affordable option for both individual users and businesses.

Possible disadvantages of PDF-XChange Editor

  • Learning Curve
    Due to its extensive feature set, new users may find it challenging to learn and master all of the functions and tools available in the software.
  • Limited Free Version
    The free version of PDF-XChange Editor is limited in functionality, with many advanced features requiring a paid license to access.
  • Watermarks
    Free version annotations and some features will include watermarks on the documents, which could be inconvenient for professional use.
  • Occasional Bugs
    Some users have reported occasional bugs and software instability, which could interrupt workflow and reduce productivity.
  • Complexity of Features
    Some of the advanced features may be overly complex for users who only need basic PDF editing capabilities, making the user experience overwhelming.

Analysis of QPDF

Overall verdict

  • QPDF is considered a good tool, especially for users who need a robust solution for handling PDFs in a command-line environment. Its performance and range of features make it a reliable choice for technical users.

Why this product is good

  • QPDF is a powerful open-source command-line tool for manipulating PDF files. It is highly regarded for its ability to efficiently process and convert PDFs, offering features like linearization, encryption, decryption, and content extraction. Its open-source nature allows for transparency and customization, which appeals to developers and those concerned about software reliability and security.

Recommended for

  • Developers who require integration of PDF processing in their applications
  • System administrators who prefer command-line tools
  • Users needing to perform batch processing of PDFs
  • Security-conscious users who want an open-source PDF solution

Analysis of PDF-XChange Editor

Overall verdict

  • PDF-XChange Editor is considered a good choice for those requiring a robust PDF editing solution. It combines functionality and ease of use, making it appealing to a broad spectrum of users from casual users to professionals.

Why this product is good

  • PDF-XChange Editor is widely regarded as a powerful and versatile PDF editing software. It offers a wide range of features, including text editing, annotation tools, OCR (Optical Character Recognition), and the ability to create and fill forms. Its user-friendly interface and efficient performance are often praised, making it suitable for both basic and advanced PDF editing tasks. Additionally, it supports a wide array of file formats and provides integration with popular cloud storage services.

Recommended for

  • Individuals who frequently need to edit or annotate PDF documents.
  • Professionals requiring advanced PDF functionality such as OCR and form creation.
  • Users looking for a cost-effective alternative to other leading PDF editors.
  • People who value integration with cloud storage and multiple file format support.

QPDF videos

+ Add

qPDF

PDF-XChange Editor videos

+ Add

PDF-XChange Viewer Tutorial

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to QPDF and PDF-XChange Editor)

QPDF

PDF-XChange Editor

PDF Tools
10 10%
PDF Tools
90% 90
PDF Editor
9 9%
PDF Editor
91% 91
PDF Creator
9 9%
PDF Creator
91% 91
PDF
100 100%
PDF
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare QPDF and PDF-XChange Editor

QPDF Reviews

We have no reviews of QPDF yet.
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PDF-XChange Editor Reviews

The 13 Best Free PDF Editors (February 2024)
PDF-XChange Editor offers some great tools, but not all of them are free to use. If you use a non-free feature, the PDF will save with a watermark on every page.
Source: www.lifewire.com
8 Best Adobe Acrobat Alternatives In 2022 [Updated List]
PDF-Xchange Editor is one of the most inexpensive alternatives to Acrobat Pro. It has all the tools necessary for creating, editing, and annotating PDF files and also has OCR and tools for digitally signing the documents. It also allows you to export PDF files to MS Office formats.
Source: www.softwaretestinghelp.com
10 Best PDF Expert Alternatives for Various Tasks in 2022
Thereby, PDF Xchange Editor comes before PDF Expert in the OCR technology. This PDF expert alternative provides you with the advanced OCR plug-in of ABBYY, which counts to be more precise, adaptive, and faster than the standard OCR engine (at work by PDF Expert), and be completed with features such as dynamic stamps, say, a stamp that adopts the system date in an automatic...
Source: fixthephoto.com
13 of the Best Free PDF Readers
For those users looking to add audio to their PDFs, PDF-XChange Editor could be the solution. Besides the having ability to add recordings and other audio, users can view and edit the PDF files, along with adding in a signature. The best feature of PDF-XChange, though, might be its Optical Character Recognition Tool. With this tool, users can scan in a printed document and...
Source: www.indeed.com
Top 5 Best Free Alternatives to Adobe Acrobat DC
PDF-XChange Editor offers amazing amount of features for free (about 80%). Some of them are free only in Editor (but not free in others competitors). And all free features in Editor are very precise and detailed. With the stable work and good support, PDF-XChange Editor is very user-friendly for high level professional documents
Source: whatvwant.com

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, QPDF seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 11 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

QPDF mentions (11)

  • Ask HN: What Underrated Open Source Project Deserves More Recognition?
    Qpdf[1], and, in particular, libqpdf, is the most useful PDF tool I've ever used, because it was the first library I found that works at the proper level of abstraction for dealing with the PDF file format on its own terms. In other words, the library directly exposes the essential PDF object structure (pages, dictionaries, strings, numbers, streams, etc.) for easy editing, while abstracting away as much of... - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Insecure Features in PDFs
    Given how well Preview.app and Safari work for viewing >99% of PDFs I actually encounter in the wild, this article makes Apple's engineering decisions look good. It also confirms many suspicions I've had over the years that have led me to, e.g., running all PDFs from questionable sources through VirusTotal before viewing on platforms where I wouldn't normally run antivirus software. The original article also... - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Jim Keller criticizes Nvidia CUDA, x86 – 'CUDA's a swamp, not a moat, like x86'
    I know you're talking about GUI editing, but I've found libqpdf[1] incredibly useful for making programmatic PDF edits with minimal (typically no) structural disturbance. [1] https://qpdf.sourceforge.io. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Is ExifCleaner still okay to use? No updates in over a year.
    Exiftool edits to PDFs are reversible. The file needs to be re-linearized by a utility such as qpdf. See the exiftool PDF tags page and exifcleaner issue #111. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Is there any Adobe Acrobat DC/Pro-like PDF reader application in Linux?
    Page organization => If you want a gui, you could use pdfshuffler or pdfsam, though I usually use command like tools like qpdf (or pdftk, stapler, pdfjam, or even ghostscript). Source: about 3 years ago
View more

PDF-XChange Editor mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of PDF-XChange Editor yet. Tracking of PDF-XChange Editor recommendations started around Mar 2021.

What are some alternatives?

When comparing QPDF and PDF-XChange Editor, you can also consider the following products

PDFsam - PDFsam Basic, a free, open source, multi-platform software designed to split, merge, extract pages, mix and rotate PDF files

Adobe Acrobat DC - Make your job easier with Adobe Acrobat DC, the trusted PDF creator. Use Acrobat to convert, edit and sign PDF files at your desk or on the go.

PDF Unshare - pdf unshare, pdf protection, protect, share, updf, prevent, Lock PDF, Encrypt PDF, PDF Access, Lock, PDF, Encrypt, Access

Sumatra PDF - Sumatra PDF is a slim PDF/DjVu/EPUB/XPS/CHM/CBR/CBZ/MOBI viewer for Windows.

PDFTK Builder - PDFTK Builder is a free graphical interface to for PDFTK, making it much easier to use.

PDF24 PDF Creator - Create PDF and convert documents to PDF for free with the free PDF24 PDF Creator.

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