PDF Expert for Mac
PDF Expert has always been a winner for me, but these newest features really make it a 'gold' standard in my book. Readdle has changed their pricing model for the app so that users can get all three versions - Mac, iPhone, and iPad - for one price. The new features are outstanding and any fans of PDF Expert won't be disappointed when they dig into the updated app.
- DESIGN
- EASE OF USE
- PRICE
Readdle introduces the all-new PDF Expert for Mac to make your PDF life easy.
I’ve been a user of PDF Expert user since 2015. It was refreshing to find a professional-level PDF editor that wasn’t Adobe-related and PDF Expert has consistently been a reliable application for me. You can imagine my excitement when I learned that a newly designed version 3.0 was being released today. The new version brings an effortless-to-use design, smart OCR technology, PDF to Word conversion, and more.
About PDF Expert for Mac
PDF Expert is a fast and easy-to-use PDF editor that can edit PDF text, images and links, take notes, fill out forms, and more. PDF Expert for iOS has been around for 12 years while the Mac version was launched in 2015. Today, it is used by more than 6 million people! Readdle’s goal with PDF Expert was to build the best-in-class PDF experience for Apple devices.
With that in mind, they update the app alongside Apple’s newest technologies. For example, the new OCR feature in PDF Expert is powered by the Apple Vision framework, providing the fastest experience on macOS.
What’s New in PDF Expert for Mac?
The NEW PDF Expert for Mac is the biggest update to the app in years. The new version brings an easy-to-use design, OCR to turn scans into text, PDF to Word conversion, and more. PDF Expert is available with new cross-platform accounts or, for Mac only, with a lifetime license. These updates mean that PDF Expert firmly entrenches its position as the go-to PDF app for iPhone, iPad, and Mac. To read Readdle’s Blog about the update, click here.
Main Features of the Update
- Brand-new design including Dark Mode that’s effortless to use – we improved every detail to help you get your work done easier and faster. This update also brings the much-awaited Dark Mode to please your eyes.
- Conversion to and from PDF to Word and other formats – turn PDFs into Word, Excel, TXT, JPG, PNG, and PowerPoint files and vice versa.
- Smart OCR technology – convert scanned PDFs into text, so you can copy, highlight, and search through PDFs.
- Smart Enhance – improve the quality of scanned PDFs: fix contrast, remove distortion, edit margins, split pages, and more.
Privacy Policy
PDF Expert stores your files locally on your device and only you have access to them. None of your files or data of any kind is transmitted to or stored by Readdle’s servers. See the developer’s privacy policy for more information.
Pricing & Availability
- PDF Expert introduces a single subscription for iPhone, iPad, and Mac with 7-day free access to Premium for all new users (no-commitment) and then $79.99/year.
- Those who require only the Mac version can purchase a lifetime license for $139.99.
- Existing customers retain all the features they had before and keep them forever. For new features (OCR, PDF to Word conversion, scan enhancement, and cross-device access), they can upgrade to Premium with 50% off the first year.
User Experience
As an avid user of PDF Expert, I was thrilled to see what was coming based on their list of updates. Dark Mode was of special interest to me but being able to convert PDF files to other formats was also a feature I’ve been waiting on for a while. Here is a quick rundown on my thoughts about each of the newest features of PDF Expert for Mac.
Dark Mode: This is actually a bigger part of the overall UI facelift that PDF Expert has received. I’ve always liked the way that it functions, but really love what the Readdle team has done to update the look. All of the icons are modernized and there are some tiny details such as the ability to increase the line width on the pen tool that make the design update worthwhile.
The dark mode aspect of the redesign has really helped me focus more on the document rather than the tools. This is something I’ve noticed about the dark mode as a feature in other apps as well – it helps the user to maintain focus. It’s also much easier for me to read. I really love that Readdle made it easy for users who prefer dark mode system-wide to use this interface.
Smart OCR: This is another big feature I’ve been dying to be included in PDF Expert. I get a lot of PDFs from clients that need to be edited and I can’t easily search through their content because the pages are locked and not displayed as text layers. I’ve gotten by in the past by using tools like Text Sniper to grab text from PDFs, but it’s so much nicer having OCR included with PDF Expert.
Not too long ago, we ran into a technical problem on MacSources.com. We ended up having to create PDFs of all our articles so they could be recreated in the event that our site was unreachable. We found out after the fact that those PDFs were not readable if tried to copy/paste the text out of them. This OCR feature would have saved us tons of time.
It seems to work really well. I even used one of those PDFs as a test and PDF Expert was able to read the text and for the first time, I could copy it effortlessly. This feature alone is worth the upgrade in my opinion.
PDF Conversion: While this is as easy as clicking on the Export tab in PDF Expert, I can’t tell you how much time this feature saves me. I have created countless PDFs in my work that someone asks to have in a Word format. I’ve spent hours of time over the years recreating PDFs as Word documents by hand. Are there other apps that can accomplish this task? Yes. In fact, Preview on the Mac can export a PDF as a JPG, but that adds an extra step in the process when you could simply export it from PDF Expert once you are done editing the document. The team at Readdle has made this a convenient step and cured a headache for me that I’ve had for years.
Smart Enhance Tool: This is a feature that I didn’t know I wanted, but now that I have it, I never want to let it go. This powerful editing tool is very similar to photo retouching to me. I’ve had many scans that end up with crooked pages or crinkled paper caught in the scan. These sorts of issues make the scans imperfect and when you are working with professional-level documents, you want to make sure everything is just right.
The Smart Enhance tool gives users the ability to fix these errors without leaving PDF Expert. In the past, this is something I would have used Photoshop for, but now I can click just a couple of options to clean up ‘dirty’ scans. I’m particularly fond of the ability to split a double-page – like from a book – into two separate pages.
Conclusion
Even though upgrading to the NEW PDF Expert for Mac is not 100% free for existing users, I do like that Readdle is introducing a single, universal license payment that works across all Apple devices. I also really like that PDF Expert offers a free trial (7 days) so users can try it before they buy. As much as I’ve used PDF Expert over the years, I think it’s a worthy investment.
All the new features of PDF Expert for Mac are premium features and they ensure that users have the best possible experience when using the app. If you aren’t already a PDF Expert user, now is the time to become one.
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