PDF (Portable Document Format) is the most popular file format for the distribution of digital documents, used by everyone to share and store digital documents of all kinds, from books, to software guides, instruction booklets, school reports, term papers, business reports and so on. The question that could arise is: how to write on a PDF file to edit it or add text "> AbleWord is a Word-like program, to write documents as you would normally do with an Office program.
Its most interesting peculiarity is that it can read and write PDF files.
You can then add, remove and edit text and images in a PDF, check spelling, insert tables and frames.
The free program is also capable of converting a PDF file to Word file and vice versa.
2) PDF-XChange Viewer is instead an old commercial and professional-level program which, despite not being updated for some time, is still available for download in the version to be installed (EXE file) or portable, as a ZIP file to extract.
I had talked about this program several years ago as the best one for inserting and writing text fields on PDF.
Stamps, captions, sticky notes, oval and rectangular shapes can be added to PDF files. Not only that, there are also tools that can be used to measure the distance, perimeter and area of the specified region (s) on documents. And the fact that PDF-XChange Viewer is available as a portable app does only the best things.
Although PDF-XChange Viewer is still available, it has now been replaced by a more advanced, non-free program called PDF-XChange Editor.
3) PDFescape is an application that can be used via the web or by downloading the program, ideal for making quick changes, simple to use, for writing a new PDF starting from an empty sheet and adding text boxes, images, forms, captions., notes, website links and freehand drawings.
You can also edit a previously written PDF and, of course, download the edited documents online (via the PDF keys) if you register for a free account.
The only limitation is that the PDF file you want to write to is no larger than 10 MB and 100 pages in length.
4) PDFzorro is a similar and free app that allows you to write text on PDFs and use a highlighter.
In this web application you can add password protection to the PDF and you can also compress the file to make it smaller.
5) DocHub is a free web app to use directly on the browser, with powerful PDF editing tools, which is also perfect for signing documents freehand.
All changes are saved in the cloud in real time and the site connects, securely, to the Dropbox or Google account.
6) PDF Eraser, already described among programs to edit text and images in PDFs, is very particular because it works as a tool that deletes text and images and then writes on them or adds different images.
It is a fairly simple program, not particularly advanced, but very effective for writing PDFs.
But in addition to PDF Escape, how can you write a PDF from scratch having all the tools of an advanced writing program available?
Nothing could be simpler, just use the free and open source LibreOffice writing program which allows you to save any document by exporting it to PDF files.
Alternatively, you can also use a PDF printer which becomes usable by any program that can print.
BONUS: The best program to write on an existing PDF of any type, for free, which also contains all the tools of a commercial and professional software is Libreoffice Draw, included in the LibreOffice suite.
This program, which should be the equivalent of Microsoft Visio, allows you to open a PDF and then click on each line of text to change and modify it, even in the font.
You can also easily add images and write other text boxes, insert links, tables, freehand drawings, shapes, photos, graphics etc.
Other programs to write PDF, create them from scratch or edit PDF are:
- Foxit PDF
- NitroPDF
- Expert PDF Reader
- PDF Edit
