Scan documents, recognise their text and arrange pages into searchable PDFs.
Free desktop app · GPL-2.0-or-later · No scan/OCR quota · Windows, macOS and Linux
Files & utilities
PDF24 Creator
Free optionLocal
Merge, split, compress and OCR PDFs offline.
What you can use it for
Merge, split, compress and OCR PDFs offline.
- Merge, split, compress and OCR PDFs offline.
Workflow coverage and comparison notes
Assemble, merge, split, annotate, compress and format PDF pages locally using the 100% free PDF24 Creator desktop utility instead of purchasing Foxit PDF Editor licenses. For ZenDocs: Merge, split, compress, convert and OCR PDFs locally on Windows 10/11. Free for private and business use without software usage quotas. Does not replace every AI feature, mobile app or existing-paragraph reflow editor.
Before you switch
Windows 10/11 desktop. No claim of full Acrobat text editing or hosted signature parity. For UPDF: create, merge, split, reorder, compress and OCR PDFs locally on Windows. Free for private and business use without a usage quota. This replaces document-processing tasks, not full editing/reflow of existing paragraphs, the UPDF AI assistant, mobile apps or cloud synchronisation. For PDF Candy: Merge, split, reorder, compress and OCR PDFs offline on Windows without hourly software quotas; free for private and business use. Your hardware limits capacity. Not the complete PDF Candy web conversion catalogue, existing-paragraph reflow editor or AI suite.
Alternatives to these paid apps
Each comparison covers the workflow described above, rather than every paid feature.
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