Comparison

PDF Pro vs LightPDF

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

PDF Pro

Edit, annotate, and read PDF documents on your iPhone and iPad. Highlight text, add notes, shapes, voice recordings, and photos. Search your entire PDF library, fill out forms, and sign documents.

Highlights
  • Edit and annotate PDFs
  • Highlight text and add notes
  • Embed audio and photo annotations
  • Full-text search of PDF library
  • Fill out and sign PDF forms
  • Organize PDFs with folders and tags
  • Import from cloud storage
Features
Read full description

PDF Pro lets you read, edit and annotate your PDF documents directly on your iPhone and iPad. Highlight text, take notes, embed shapes or draw with your finger. You can even embed voice recordings or photo annotations. Full-text-search your entire PDF library with just a single tap. Above all PDF Pro comes with full-featured PDF form and signature support. Key-Features At A Glance: • POWERFUL SEARCH: ∙ Full-text-search your entire PDF library. ∙ Search inside specific documents with easy navigation through the search results. ∙ Look-up selected text directly on Wikipedia or in the included dictionaries. • FILE-MANAGEMENT: ∙ Group your PDFs in folders and tag them with colorful labels. ∙ Import PDFs from your Dropbox®, Microsoft OneDrive® or Google Drive®. ∙ Add PDFs via USB or WiFi. ∙ Open E-Mail attachments. • CLEAR VIEW: ∙ Easily browse through all your annotations. ∙ Full PDF outline support. You can even search the outline. ∙ Get an overview of all your bookmarked or annotated pages just with a single tap. • SHARE and PRINT: ∙ Easily share your annotated documents with your friends or co-workers. ∙ Print your annotated and edited PDFs. ∙ You can even share or print single pages of a document. • HIGH SPEED and STABILITY: ∙ Rapid viewing of PDF documents. ∙ Smooth display of very large PDF files. • NIGHT MODE: ∙ Makes reading in the dark much easier on the eyes. • SECURITY: ∙ Support for password-protected PDFs • AND MUCH MORE... Premium Features and Premium Offer include: • ANNOTATIONS and NOTES: ∙ Highlight text, take notes or draw with your finger. ∙ Powerful shape editor for arrows, rectangles, circles, lines and much more. ∙ Embed audio and photo annotations into your PDFs. ∙ Use predefined stamps or create your own. • DOCUMENT EDITOR: ∙ Create new pages. ∙ Export pages or merge them into existing documents. ∙ Reorder, rotate and delete pages. • CONTENT EDITOR: • Modify the existing content of PDF documents. • MULTITASKING: ∙ Work with multiple PDFs at a time. ∙ Copy and paste annotations, shapes, images or text from one PDF document into another. • FORM SUPPORT: ∙ Just fill out your PDF form, sign it with your handwritten signature and you are ready to send it via E-Mail or print it via AirPrint®. A monthly or annual subscription is required to get access to all premium features and premium offer. --- Subscriptions automatically renew monthly or yearly depending on your plan unless auto-renew is turned off at least 24-hours before the end of the current period. Plans are priced at $3.99USD monthly and $24.99USD yearly (pricing may vary in countries other than the U.S.). Payment will be charged to your App Store Account at confirmation of purchase. To avoid automatic renewal, you must turn off auto-renew at least 24 hours before your subscription ends. You can turn off auto-renew at any time from your App Store Account Settings. Terms of Use: https://pdf-pro.net/terms-of-service/ Privacy Policy: https://pdf-pro.net/privacy-policy/

About

LightPDF

This app offers a comprehensive suite of tools for managing PDF documents on your mobile device. It leverages AI to summarize, chat with, and convert PDFs, along with scanning capabilities, text extraction, and editing features. It also includes an ID photo maker and watermark removal.

Highlights
  • AI Chat with PDFs
  • Phone Scanner to PDF
  • PDF to Word/JPG/Excel Converter
  • OCR Text Extraction
  • PDF Editing and Annotation
  • ID Photo Maker
  • Watermark Removal
Features
Read full description

LightPDF, AI-powered, is a must-have PDF toolkit for your mobile device. You can use it to summarize and chat with PDFs and other documents, and quickly get the key information from the files! And it takes advantage of AI to help you easily scan paperwork to PDFs, extract texts and remove specific objects. It can be your PDF converter, editor, reader, on-the-go mobile scanner, cloud-based PDF storage, and ID photo maker. Try LightPDF to convert, OCR, scan, edit, read, annotate, comment, compress, and merge PDFs easily and quickly to get a high-quality result. And its sharing and collaborating feature can help you communicate smoothly with your colleagues on the same PDF document, and improve your teamwork productivity. What LightPDF can do: Smart AI Chat Assistant for PDFs - Ask questions to the chatbot about your file and it will answer you with cited sources - Quickly output results in markdown and table formats - Chat with PDFs, scans, Excel, Word, PPT, and ePub documents Intelligent Phone Scanner - Take photos of your papers, cards, books, and more to turn them into PDF format. Work as your pocket PDF scanner - Extract and copy texts from paper works - Remove handwriting from the test paper - Advanced filter features for better scanning result Powerful PDF Converter with OCR - Convert PDF to Word, JPG, PNG, Excel, PPT, and TXT, as well as turn Word, PPT, Excel, JPG, PNG, and CAD formats to PDF - Equipped with OCR technology to recognize and turn PDF scans and photos into docx, xlsx, pptx, pdf, and txt formats - Convert multiple documents at the same time and quickly get your work done Cloud-based PDF Editor & Reader - Edit, sign, and add images to a PDF file - Highlight, draw markups, and insert notes into PDF - Reduce PDF file size with a few touches - Combine multiple PDF documents into one - Read PDFs, add bookmarks, search and annotate - Print PDFs directly from your devices - Auto-sync PDFs in order to work with PDFs on the go. No more worry about losing data Handy ID Photo Maker - Create ID and passport photos with ease. It allows you to remove the background, change the background color, and produce a new photo with the selected size - Unblur the photo to enhance its quality and make it clear Image Watermark Removal - AI automatically recognizes and removes watermarks from images, eliminating the need for manual smudging like in Photoshop. It is particularly effective for large logos and full-screen watermarks, enhancing learning efficiency. New Way for Teamwork - Share files via links with your team and invite multiple people to view, edit, highlight, sign, and add comments on the same PDF at the same time - Set permissions to keep PDF security under control - Upload the file to the cloud, and access it on any device - Star files as favorites to quickly find and open them Subscriptions will be charged to your credit card through your iTunes account. Your subscription will automatically renew unless canceled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. After purchase, please manage your subscriptions in the App Store Account Settings. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If you need any help or have suggestions on LightPDF, please feel free to contact us. We can't keep making progress without your voice. Email: support@lightpdf.com Customer Service Center: https://lightpdf.com/contact FAQ: https://lightpdf.com/faqs/lightpdf-editor-faq Privacy Policy:https://lightpdf.com/privacy Terms of Service:https://lightpdf.com/terms

Screenshots

PDF Pro4 screens
LightPDF4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is monetization model: LightPDF at free with in-app purchases against PDF Pro's subscription. LightPDF also leads on review sentiment (88% vs 60%) and update cadence (every 2 weeks vs every 2 months). PDF Pro's advantage is rating (4.7 vs 4.3) and ratings volume (7K vs 52). On price, ads, in-app purchases and device support 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. PDF Pro sells 12 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month and LightPDF sells 12 in-app purchases, starting at $13.99 per 7 days. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

PDF Pro holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 4.3. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: PDF Pro has 7K ratings behind it against 52, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 60% of PDF Pro's written reviews are positive against 88% of LightPDF's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

PDF Pro ships an update every 2 months, LightPDF every 2 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 22, 2026 and October 19, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 4 level
PDF Pro versus LightPDF: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPDF ProLightPDF
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.7 (7K ratings) — better4.3 (52 ratings)
Positive reviews60.0% of reviews88.4% of reviews — better
Number of ratings7K — better52
Update frequencyEvery 2 monthsEvery 2 weeks — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationSubscriptionFree with in-app purchases — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, Mac — betteriPhone, iPod
Requires iOS17.014.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size97 MB113 MB
Age rating4+17+
DeveloperDominic RodemerWangxu Technology Co., Ltd

Customer experience

PDF Pro

All ratings6,945 ratings
Positive93.4%
Neutral3.2%
Negative3.4%
Written reviews425 reviews
Positive60.0%
Neutral10.4%
Negative29.6%

LightPDF

All ratings52 ratings
Positive92.3%
Neutral0.0%
Negative7.7%
Written reviews86 reviews
Positive88.4%
Neutral0.0%
Negative11.6%

User reviews

PDF Pro

From 7K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 User-friendly interface
  • 🚀 Fast and efficient
  • 💡 Excellent PDF management features
  • 🔒 Secure and reliable
  • 🎨 Great annotation tools

Room to improve

  • 🐛 Crashes and stability issues
  • 💰 Expensive subscription model
  • 🔍 Inconsistent search functionality
  • 📖 Loses last read position
  • 🖋️ Unreliable handwriting support

LightPDF

From 52 App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 User-friendly interface
  • 🚀 Efficient PDF tools
  • ✨ High-quality PDF to Word conversion
  • 💡 Impressive OCR functionality
  • 💬 Helpful AI chatbot

Room to improve

  • 💸 High price
  • ❌ App doesn't work
  • 💳 Unexpected charges
  • 🚫 Watermark removal issues
  • 📉 Blurry pictures

Bugs and requests

PDF Pro

Reported bugs

5 issues
  • Annotations and highlights randomly disappearing
  • Compatibility issues with newer iOS versions
  • Corrupted PDF files after editing
  • Slow performance on older devices
  • Inconsistent behavior when switching between PDFs

Requested features

5 requests
  • Improved bookmarking and note-taking
  • Seamless iCloud/cloud storage integration
  • Customizable keyboard shortcuts
  • Advanced text editing and OCR capabilities
  • Better organization and folder management

LightPDF

Reported bugs

5 issues
  • App requests more money after payment
  • Paid subscription not unlocking features
  • Trial period charged despite cancellation
  • Scans cut off PDF to 3 pages or under
  • Performance issues

Requested features

3 requests
  • iPad support
  • Edit text in the exact same font
  • More advanced editing features

In-app purchases

12 purchases

PDF Pro

Subscriptions12
  • Offer - Monthly - macOS3 Days trial$1.991 Month
  • Offer - Monthly - iOS3 Days trial$2.991 Month
  • Premium - Monthly - iOS3 Days trial$3.991 Month
Show 9 more
  • Premium - Monthly - macOS3 Days trial$4.991 Month
  • Offer - Annual - iOS3 Days trial$12.991 Year
  • Offer - Annual - macOS3 Days trial$22.991 Year
  • Premium - Annual - iOS3 Days trial$24.991 Year
  • Offer - macOS + iOS3 Days trial$24.991 Year
  • Offer - iOS + macOS3 Days trial$29.991 Year
  • Premium - Annual - macOS3 Days trial$44.991 Year
  • Premium - iOS + macOS3 Days trial$49.991 Year
  • Premium - macOS + iOS3 Days trial$49.991 Year
12 purchases

LightPDF

Subscriptions5
  • LightPDF Weekly Subscription$13.997 Days
  • LightPDF Monthly Subscription2 variants$19.991 Month
  • LightPDF Yearly Subscription$47.991 Year
Show 2 more
  • LightPDF Annual Subscription$49.991 Year
  • LightPDF Yearly Subscription3 Days trial$59.991 Year
One-time7
  • iOS LightPDF - 1 Week$9.99
  • 買一年送一年$79.99
  • 1年購入で1年おまけ$84.99
Show 4 more
  • 2 zum Preis von 1$99.99
  • 3-Year Subscription$99.99
  • Mac LightPDF Lifetime Plan$109.99
  • Buy 3 yrs Get 3 yrs Free$149.99

Questions

Is PDF Pro free?
PDF Pro is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is LightPDF free?
LightPDF is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, PDF Pro or LightPDF?
PDF Pro is rated higher. PDF Pro averages 4.7 out of 5 from 7K ratings, while LightPDF averages 4.3 from 52 ratings.
Do PDF Pro or LightPDF have ads?
Neither PDF Pro nor LightPDF shows ads.
Which is updated more often, PDF Pro or LightPDF?
PDF Pro ships an update every 2 months, and LightPDF every 2 weeks. Most recently, PDF Pro was updated on October 22, 2026 and LightPDF on October 19, 2026.

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