PDFWise vs PDF Toolbox
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
PDFWise
This app offers a comprehensive suite of PDF tools that operate entirely on your device, ensuring complete privacy. It allows you to read, scan, edit, sign, and organize your documents without uploading them to any cloud service. Generate professional PDFs from templates and perform batch operations for efficiency.
- 100% on-device processing
- Built-in scanner with OCR
- PDF editing and annotation tools
- Handwritten signature support
- Professional PDF template generation
- Batch processing for files
- On-device full-text search
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PDFWise – PDF Reader & Tools The privacy-first PDF app for people who never wanted to upload their documents in the first place. PDFWise is a fast, complete PDF reader, scanner, editor and signer built for iPhone and iPad. Every feature runs 100% on your device. No accounts, no cloud, no analytics on your documents — your PDFs never leave your iPhone. 100% PRIVATE BY DESIGN OCR, search indexing, compression, encryption — all happen locally on your device. PDFWise has zero servers and zero network calls for any document operation. No tracking, no profiling, no ads. SCAN ANY DOCUMENT Use the built-in scanner to capture pages with auto edge detection and perspective correction. Pages are OCR'd on device so you can search inside scanned documents instantly. Works for contracts, receipts, notes, books and handwritten pages. POWERFUL READER & ANNOTATIONS Smooth PDF viewer with thumbnails, outline (TOC) sidebar, night mode tint and continuous scroll. Add sticky notes, drawings, highlights, shapes and rubber stamps. Search inside the file with a Safari-style find bar. SIGN ANY PDF Save handwritten signatures in a library and apply them to any PDF with full control over position, size, ink color and which pages. Signatures bake permanently into the page so the result holds up in any reader. 14 PROFESSIONAL TEMPLATES Generate Invoice, Receipt, Quotation, Meeting Minutes, Agenda, Letterhead, Sign-In Sheet, Resume, Cover Letter, To-Do List, Travel Itinerary, Certificate, Class Schedule and Flyer in seconds — fill a form, get a polished PDF. ALL THE TOOLS YOU NEED Merge, split, compress, watermark, encrypt with password, add page numbers, convert TXT/Markdown/HTML to PDF, import from URL, combine photos into PDF — every common PDF task in one place. BATCH PROCESSING Compress, watermark or encrypt many PDFs at once with one tap. Perfect for accountants, lawyers, students and freelancers handling stacks of files. POWERFUL ON-DEVICE SEARCH Find any word across your entire library — including scanned documents — in milliseconds. FTS5 full-text search with boolean operators and exact-phrase queries. iOS Spotlight integration so you can search from the home screen. FACE ID / TOUCH ID PASSWORDS Opt in to remember PDF passwords with Face ID or Touch ID. Stored in the iOS keychain under biometric access control — only your face or fingerprint unlocks. SHORTCUTS & SIRI 10 Siri shortcuts: "Hey Siri, scan a document", "Compress a PDF", "Merge PDFs" and more. Automate your PDF workflow without opening the app. 14 LANGUAGES Fully translated to English, Vietnamese, Spanish, Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese, French, German, Russian, Arabic, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese. WHY CHOOSE PDFWISE? - 100% on-device — your PDFs never leave your iPhone - No accounts, no cloud, no tracking, no ads - Fast, native, battery-friendly - Free of subscription paywalls - Built for iPhone and iPad with iOS native design - 14 languages, RTL support for Arabic Download PDFWise today and take back control of your documents. We read every review. If something feels off or you want a feature, tell us — we ship updates fast.
PDF Toolbox
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PdfToolbox is a local-first workspace for creating, scanning, editing, and managing PDF documents on iPhone and iPad. CREATE AND IMPORT • Import PDF documents from Files and iCloud. • Create PDFs from photos, scans, text, HTML, Markdown, and supported web content. • Scan multi-page documents using your device camera. EDIT AND ORGANIZE • Highlight, underline, draw, add notes, annotate, and fill PDF forms. • Add signatures and work with supported document fields. • Rotate, crop, reorder, duplicate, insert, extract, split, merge, and delete pages. • Organize documents using folders, favorites, recent files, and trash. • Search documents and quickly return to your latest revisions. CONVERT AND EXTRACT • Convert PDFs to images, text, or TIFF. • Convert images, text, HTML, and Markdown into PDF documents. • Use OCR to recognize text in scanned documents. • Extract text, images, QR codes, and other supported document content. PROTECT YOUR DOCUMENTS • Add passwords and watermarks. • Redact sensitive information. • Sanitize documents and review security details. • Verify supported digital signatures and generate audit information. LOCAL-FIRST WORKFLOW Your documents are generally processed and stored locally in the app sandbox. Imported files are copied into the app workspace, helping protect the original source files from unintended changes. Autosave and revision history help preserve your latest edits as you work. PdfToolbox brings essential PDF tools together in one focused and easy-to-use mobile workspace.
Screenshots
Verdict
PDFWise and PDF Toolbox are too close to call on the numbers: across 5 compared parameters — price, ads, in-app purchases and device support among them — neither pulls far enough ahead to decide it. What separates them is feature set and interface, not measurable difference.
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. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
| Parameter | PDFWise | PDF Toolbox |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (7 ratings) — better | — |
| Number of ratings | 7 — better | — |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | — |
| Devices | iPhone | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 17.6 — better | 18.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 8 MB | 43 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | THI HUE MAI | Kynova Labs |
In-app purchases
PDFWise
No in-app purchases
PDF Toolbox
No in-app purchases









