PDFCreator Full Review and Alternatives

pdfcreator-small-logo

PDFCreator

3.9/5

Overview

PDFCreator, a pdfforge GmbH craft, is a Windows software that helps you convert any printable document into PDF format. This is made possible by creating a virtual printer that simply prints to PDF files and therefore lets any application create PDFs either within the app itself or using PDFCreator as the default PDF printer.

Even though the offline version of this program is the most popular, you will be happy to know that it is also available as an online tool. Some of the supported formats include PDF/A, PDF/X, PNG, JPEG, TIFF, and TXT. Apart from PDF conversion, this PDF creator also provides ways to secure, sign, merge PDFs, among other features.

To improve your workflow, this software presents tokens that can be used as placeholders for certain information. Amazingly, PDFCreator provides several editions including Free, Professional, Terminal Server, and Server edition. Before we dive into the features here are some of the pros and cons;

Pros & Cons of PDFCreator

Pros
  • Offers PDF protection options
  • Supports remote deployment
  • Works as a PDF creator and merger
  • Free and open-source
  • Multilingual
  • Provides printer profiles
Cons
  • Ad-laden free edition
  • No PDF editing options

How to Use PDFCreator

Key Features in PDFCreator

PDFCreator provides you with a plethora of features that gear you towards the kind of output you require at the end of the process. Without further ado, let us have a look at the list of features at your disposal;

  • Allows you to convert printable documents like Microsoft Word, Excel, and more into PDF. Also capable of converting PDFs into images like JPG, PNG, and TIFF.

pdfcreator_printer

  • Helps you digitally sign documents to verify that you are the author and rid you of the need to print or scan a document.
  • Offers automatic document saving to avoid lots of interaction and even facilitates an automated workflow through the use of tokens.
  • Allows you to archive PDFs by creating PDF/A files that can be stored for years and still remain readable.
  • Offers customizable preset profiles for PDF conversion and also lets you come up with your own from scratch, based on your needs.

pdfcreator_set_profile

  • Helps you combine multiple documents into a single PDF thanks to the merge feature. Also, you can rearrange documents accordingly when duty calls.
  • Offers to secure your documents by restricting access or adjustments using passwords. For instance, you can encrypt documents to restrict opening, copying, printing, editing, among other kinds of changes.

pdfcreator_secure_document

  • Features a COM interface that can be controlled using scripts to perform multiple actions with little effort. In fact, this is a feature that most of the other similar programs do not come close to.
  • Helps you to optimize PDF documents through different levels of compression to meet certain specific needs, like reducing the size to meet the maximum file upload size limit.
  • A multilingual interface that can be localized to any of the supported languages and make it pretty convenient to navigate the interface.

PDFCreator Professional vs PDFCreator Free

PDFCreator Pro comes with all the features in the Free version and goes on to boast some nifty and exclusive features. The Pro version;

  • Presents an ad-free experience and direct email user support.
  • Offers the HotFolder feature; files added into this folder are automatically processed.
  • Allows for unattended deployment, therefore, making it possible to work remotely.
  • Features a special Images2PDF tool that, going by the name, helps to conveniently convert images into PDF format.

Pricing

While PDFCreator Free can be used without spending a single dime, the Professional version presents a yearly licensing plan per computer. Here is a breakdown of the various licenses prices;

License Quantity

Price/Workstation

1

$16.90

25

$15.90

50

$14.90

100

$13.90

100+

Custom Pricing (Contact sales team)

Apart from the above editions, you are also opened up to PDFCreator Terminal Server starting at $319 yearly per workstation, and the PDFCreator Server edition at $950 yearly per server.

Conclusion

PDFCreator is a really powerful program and takes on PDF processing with vim and vigor. It makes tasks easy thanks to the incorporated preset profiles and even better works as a universal PDF printer. It may not provide exact features like the fully-fledged Adobe Acrobat but even the little that it does still proves way handy. Both personal and business settings can benefit from this software making it all-around.

Scroll to Top