How to Edit PDFs on Mac (Free and Paid Options)

PDF editing on Mac used to be genuinely painful. Preview handled the basics, and anything beyond annotations meant hunting for sketchy online converters or paying for bloated software.

That’s changed a lot. In 2026, you have solid free options that handle real text editing, OCR for scanned documents, and page management, no shady downloads required. Here’s what actually works.

What You Can (and Can’t) Do With Preview

Preview is built into macOS and covers a surprising amount of ground for free. On macOS Tahoe (26.5.x) and recent versions, it handles annotations, signatures, page reordering, and basic markup without installing anything.

What it won’t do: edit existing text in a PDF. If you need to change a word or fix a typo in the original content, Preview can’t touch it. You’ll need to cover the text with a white box and layer new text on top, which works visually, but it’s a workaround, not a solution. Important: covering text with a white box does not securely redact it — the original text remains in the PDF’s underlying data and can be recovered. If you’re handling sensitive information (contracts, personal data, legal documents), use a dedicated redaction tool such as PDF Expert’s redaction feature instead.

For anything beyond that, such as direct text editing, OCR on scanned PDFs, or converting to Word, skip ahead to the third-party options below.

How to Edit a PDF in Preview

Open and Enable the Markup Toolbar

1. Double-click your PDF to open it in Preview. (If it opens in a different app, right-click the file and choose Open With > Preview.)
2. Click the Markup Toolbar button, the pencil icon in the top-right of the toolbar. If you don’t see it, go to View > Show Markup Toolbar (on macOS Tahoe, this option appears in the same location).

Add Text and Annotations

1. Click the Text tool (the T icon) in the Markup Toolbar.
2. Click anywhere on the document to place a text box, then type your content.
3. Resize and reposition the box as needed. Use the format bar to change font, size, and color.

Add a Signature

1. In the Markup Toolbar, click the Sign button (the signature icon).
2. Choose an existing signature from the dropdown, or click Create Signature to add a new one using your trackpad, camera, or iPhone.
3. Click your signature to insert it, then drag it into position on the document.

Reorder or Delete Pages

1. Go to View > Thumbnails to open the sidebar.
2. Drag page thumbnails to reorder them.
3. Select a page thumbnail and press Delete to remove it.
4. Use the rotation buttons in the toolbar to rotate individual pages.

Save Your Edits

Go to File > Export as PDF to save a new copy with your edits intact. Using File > Save will overwrite the original, which is fine if that’s what you want, but worth knowing.

When Preview Isn’t Enough

If you need to edit actual text in a PDF, work with a scanned document, or do anything involving real layout changes, you need a dedicated PDF editor. The good news: the free options in 2026 are genuinely good.

PDFgear (Best Free Option)

PDFgear is completely free, available on the Mac App Store, and handles direct text editing, OCR for scanned documents, merging, splitting, compressing, form filling, and conversion to Word or Excel. There are no daily caps or paywalled features. It’s just free.

It’s native on Apple Silicon and runs well on both Intel and M-series Macs. If you’ve been struggling with Preview’s text editing limitations, PDFgear solves that immediately.

Download it from the Mac App Store.

PDF Expert (Best Paid Option)

PDF Expert by Readdle is the gold standard for serious PDF work on Mac. It handles advanced text and image editing, OCR, AI-assisted cleanup for degraded or old PDFs, signatures, full page management, and proper redaction tools for sensitive documents. The interface is clean and the Apple Silicon performance is excellent.

There’s a free trial, but full features require a subscription. Worth it if you edit PDFs regularly for work. Not worth it if you’re doing this once a month.

Sejda (Good for Quick Text Fixes)

Sejda has a desktop app for macOS (Intel and Apple Silicon) and lets you directly add, edit, or delete text in existing PDFs, which Preview still can’t do. It also handles merging, splitting, rotating, and OCR.

The free tier has daily task and file size limits, which is fine for occasional use. If you hit the cap, the paid plan is reasonably priced.

How to Edit a PDF Using Google Docs (Free, No Download)

If you need to edit the actual text content of a PDF and don’t want to install anything, Google Docs still works as a quick conversion route. Formatting won’t survive perfectly, but it’s fine for text-heavy documents.

1. Go to Google Drive and sign in.
2. Click New > File Upload and select your PDF.

3. Once uploaded, right-click the file and choose Open With > Google Docs.

4. Make your edits in Google Docs.
5. Go to File > Download > PDF Document (.pdf) to save it back as a PDF.

One caveat: Google Docs does a reasonable job with simple text layouts, but complex formatting such as columns, tables, and custom fonts often breaks during conversion. Use PDFgear or PDF Expert if layout fidelity matters.

Which Option Should You Use?

• Annotations, signatures, page reordering: Preview is all you need.
• Direct text editing, OCR, or conversions, free: PDFgear.
• Quick text fixes with no install: Google Docs route.
• Professional PDF editing on Apple Silicon: PDF Expert.
• Occasional text edits with a desktop app: Sejda.

The “PDF editing on Mac is hard” reputation is outdated. Preview handles more than most people realize, and PDFgear fills in the gaps for free. You’re no longer stuck paying for a subscription just to fix a typo in a PDF.