PDF Reader vs Reader
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
PDF Reader
This app offers a superior PDF reading experience with its innovative Liquid Mode, which optimizes documents for mobile screens. It also provides robust tools for annotating, signing, managing, and sharing your PDF files, catering to both work and study needs.
- Liquid Mode for optimized mobile reading
- Annotation tools (pencil, text, highlighting)
- Handwritten signature insertion
- File management (move, merge, copy, delete)
- Cloud service integration (Wondershare, iCloud)
- Create blank PDFs and folders
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PDFelement - PDF Reader is a PDF reader using the latest technology. The newly connected Liquid Mode function allows you to enjoy the best reading experience. In addition, there are various annotation tools, file management, signature, Various functions such as cloud services can meet your PDF needs in work and study. PDF VIEWER • Liquid Mode gives you the best PDF reading experience • Star files to find them quickly • Easily locate recently accessed files in the "Recent" list. • Enter the page number to navigate to the desired page for viewing LIQUID MODE • Get the best PDF Reading experience with Liquid Mode • PDF document fully fits the mobile phone screen, no need to zoom in and out repeatedly. • Easily adjust brightness, font size,style, and spacing. ANNOTATE • Using Pencil to annotate like writing on the paper • Add text annotations, freely modify the text and background, border colors, choose the appropriate font and font size. • Supports many annotating tools like highlighting, underlining, squiggly lines, or strikethroughs. MANAGE • Move, merge, copy or delete files SIGNATURE • Enables handwritten signatures to be inserted anywhere within the document, while also offering the ability to zoom in and out for greater flexibility. • Built-in commonly used stamps CREATE • Quickly create completely blank PDF documents • Creat blank folders. SHARE • Sharing document content with others is just a click away with capture feature. • Select sentence(s) or pragraph(s) to share CLOUD SERVICE • PDF Reader supports uploading or downloading docs via computer, Wondershare document cloud and iCloud. Please note that this app only supports editing native PDF files. It does not support editing scanned or raster PDF. If you find you cannot edit text in PDF, please check if it is scanned PDF. Thank you! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Need HELP? Please contact us! We'll feedback to you ASAP. Email: pdfelement@wondershare.com Support Center： http://support.wondershare.com Forum： http://forum.pdf.wondershare.com Official Website： https://pdf.wondershare.com If you think this App helps you, your positive review in the App Store would be much appreciated.
Reader
This app provides a distraction-free reading and annotation experience for PDF documents on iOS. Seamlessly sync your annotated files with your Mac for further editing and workflow integration via iCloud.
- Distraction-free reading
- PDF annotation
- iCloud sync with Mac
- Companion to macOS app
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The iOS companion to the macOS Reader PDF viewer. Here you can read with no distractions and annotated, then work further with your documents back on your Mac using iCloud.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Reader at 5.0 against PDF Reader's 4.3. Reader also leads on update cadence (weekly vs every 2 months) and device support (5 vs 3). PDF Reader's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 1) and ratings volume (3.9K vs 3). On price, ads and iOS requirement there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Reader sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. PDF Reader asks for nothing beyond the download.
Reader holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.3. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: PDF Reader has 3.9K ratings behind it against 3, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 77% of PDF Reader's written reviews are positive against 56% of Reader's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
PDF Reader ships an update every 2 months, Reader weekly. The most recent releases landed on September 23, 2026 and August 14, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | PDF Reader | Reader |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.3 (3.9K ratings) | 5.0 (3 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 76.7% of reviews — better | 55.6% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 3.9K — better | 3 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months | Weekly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free — better | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac, Vision Pro — better |
| Requires iOS | 15.0 | 14.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 173 MB | 1 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Wondershare Technology (Hunan) Co.,Ltd. | The Augmented Text Company LTD |
Customer experience
PDF Reader
Reader
Bugs and requests
PDF Reader
Reported bugs
4 issues- Text boxes appearing randomly
- Inability to select/edit text in some PDFs
- Scrolling issues and page loading delays
- Incompatibility with certain PDF formats
Requested features
5 requests- Ability to edit text formatting (font, size, color)
- Support for multiple open documents
- Improved Apple Pencil integration
- Bookmark/favorite feature for frequently used PDFs
- Expanded cloud storage integration (OneDrive, Google Drive, etc.)
Reader
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
PDF Reader
No in-app purchases
Reader
- Ask AI Subscription$1.99
