Comparison

BoldSign Document Scanner vs emdee

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

Head to head
About

BoldSign Document Scanner

Features
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The BoldSign Document Scanner is a free, privacy-first scanner app that works fully offline. Scan documents, receipts, notes, contracts, IDs, forms, and more from your phone or tablet, then save them as PDF, JPG, or PNG files. Your scanned files stay on your device, so you stay in control of your documents. You can create PDFs, save images, or convert existing images into PDF files without an account or ads. Free, offline, and private: • Completely free to use. • Works fully offline. • No account setup required. • Files stay on your device. • No ads. Key features • Scan documents, receipts, notes, forms, contracts, and IDs. • Save scans as PDF, JPG, or PNG files. • Convert images to PDF. • Import images from your device. • Use automatic edge detection or manual capture. • Crop, rotate, adjust, and enhance scanned pages. • Preview and zoom pages before exporting. • Merge multiple pages into one PDF. • Rename, sort, and reorder documents. • Export files to your preferred folder. • Export multiple images together as a ZIP file. • Choose image format and quality. • Print directly from your device. • Use a light, dark, or system theme. Useful for: • Professionals scanning contracts and agreements. • Small businesses managing receipts, bills, and invoices. • Students scanning notes, assignments, and certificates. • Home users scanning IDs, forms, and personal documents. • Anyone who needs a simple offline PDF scanner app. Need to collect signatures? After scanning a document, you can use BoldSign to send it for legally binding eSignatures, track signing progress, and manage signed documents online. BoldSign includes 25 free envelopes every month, so you can start sending documents for signatures at no cost. Why use the BoldSign Document Scanner? The BoldSign Document Scanner is built for users who want a simple, private, and reliable way to scan documents. It works offline, keeps scanned files on your device, and helps you save, print, share, or send documents for eSignature when needed. For product questions or feedback, contact us at: support@boldsign.com Learn more about BoldSign: https://boldsign.com/

About

emdee

Edit Markdown files directly in a formatted view without switching modes. This app offers a true WYSIWYG experience for creating and modifying documents, including tables, lists, and images, while ensuring your files remain plain .md.

Highlights
  • True WYSIWYG Markdown editing
  • Edit directly in formatted view
  • Supports headings, bold, italic, lists, tables
  • Image insertion and display
  • Export to PDF, HTML, plain text
  • Table of contents generation
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A .md file from an AI chat, full of # and **. A browser can show it to you. emdee lets you rewrite it — in that same clean, formatted view. You don't need to switch between a reading mode and an editing mode. You edit the document while it stays clean and properly formatted, exactly as a .md document should look. Headings stay heading-sized, tables stay tables, and you type directly into the document. Want bold? Select the text and tap the button. You never type the symbols, and you never see them. Save, and it's still a plain .md file. ■ When you'd use it You saved an AI answer as .md — now you want it in your own words, not just readable AI drafted your travel plan or checklist — now the dates and details need to be yours You want to keep notes and minutes in .md, without looking up syntax as you write ■ What you can actually edit "emdee" is not a viewer — it's a true WYSIWYG Markdown editor. All of this works right in the formatted view: Headings (six levels), bold, italic, strikethrough, inline code, links Bullet lists, numbered lists, and checklists you can tick with a tap Block quotes, code blocks, horizontal rules Tables: insert with one button, and add or delete rows and columns from that same button's menu. Line breaks inside cells are supported Find and replace — Replace All comes back with a single undo It all sits in the format bar along the bottom, which rises with the keyboard so you can change formatting mid-sentence ■ Images An image in the same folder as the document you have open is drawn right there in the text. So is one in a folder below it. PNG, JPEG, GIF, WebP and SVG are drawn. So are images on the web (https://) HEIC — what an iPhone camera writes — is not drawn. Export it as JPEG and it is The first time, emdee asks permission to read that folder — one button, and it never asks again Anything it cannot draw shows its path in a frame instead The image button on the format bar puts one in. An image from outside the document's folder is copied into that folder first, and a file of the same name is never overwritten. What gets written is a relative path, so hand the images over along with the document. Exported HTML and PDF have the pictures embedded, so they travel on their own. The ![...](...) in your file is not touched by any of this. ■ More features Table of contents — tap a heading to jump there. On iPad it opens as a column beside your text instead of covering it Print, and export to PDF, HTML, or plain text. Lines break on paper exactly where they break on screen, and tables never split mid-row across pages Light, dark, or follow the system Body text can follow the system text size or stay at a size you choose, and the line width is yours: fit the screen, or match A4 print ■ What you write stays a .md No proprietary format, no importing. The file you have open is the .md itself, opened in place where it lives — no copy is made. It saves back readable by GitHub, VS Code, Obsidian — anything. Even details like line breaks inside table cells are written the standard way, as an HTML br tag. Line endings (LF / CRLF / CR) and text encodings (UTF-8, UTF-16, and legacy encodings such as Shift_JIS) are preserved exactly as the file was opened. Files made on Windows keep their format intact. ■ One purchase — iPhone, iPad, and Mac The same document, on the same page layout, wherever you open it. ■ What emdee doesn't do File management belongs to the Files app, and sync belongs to iCloud Drive. There is no proprietary notes database and no cloud service. The only thing open is your .md file. Images are looked for inside the folder your document is in, and nowhere else. A reference pointing outside it (../ or an absolute path) is not drawn, and neither are HEIC, AVIF or TIFF files, or images over roughly 8 MB (24 MB per document). Anything that cannot be drawn shows its path in a frame instead. Questions and bug reports are welcome — see the support page.

Screenshots

BoldSign Document Scanner4 screens
emdee4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: BoldSign Document Scanner at Free against emdee's $7.99. BoldSign Document Scanner also leads on iOS requirement (13.0 vs 17.0). On update cadence, 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

BoldSign Document Scanner is free to download; emdee costs $7.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Both ship on a similar rhythm, roughly every 3 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 31, 2026 and November 7, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences · 8 level
BoldSign Document Scanner versus emdee: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterBoldSign Document Scanneremdee
PriceFree — better$7.99
Rating—5.0 (1 ratings) — better
Positive reviews—100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings—1 — better
Update frequencyEvery 3 weeksEvery 3 weeks
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
Monetization—Paid
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, Mac
Requires iOS13.0 — better17.0
Further details — not scored
Size37 MB6 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperSyncfusion Inc.Keita Eto

In-app purchases

None

BoldSign Document Scanner

No in-app purchases

None

emdee

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is BoldSign Document Scanner free?
BoldSign Document Scanner is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is emdee free?
emdee costs $7.99, with no in-app purchases.
Do BoldSign Document Scanner or emdee have ads?
Neither BoldSign Document Scanner nor emdee shows ads.
Which is updated more often, BoldSign Document Scanner or emdee?
BoldSign Document Scanner ships an update every 3 weeks, and emdee every 3 weeks. Most recently, BoldSign Document Scanner was updated on October 31, 2026 and emdee on November 7, 2026.

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