PDFRaw vs PDFgear
PDFgear is a genuinely free PDF suite with desktop and mobile apps. The differences worth knowing: retention policies, trackers, and how long free stays free.
Last checked August 2026. PDFgear is a product of its respective owner; details below come from their public site and can change.
Side by side
| Feature | PDFRaw | PDFgear |
|---|---|---|
| Free to use without an account | YesAll 113 tools | Yes |
| Watermarks on output | No | No |
| Ads | No | NoPolicy reserves the right to ad trackers |
| How it stays free | Free with no paid tier; run on our own hardware | Investor funded; some advanced features planned to become paid |
| File retention (online tools) | Deleted after 2 hours, enforced three ways | Deleted after a short period; no window published |
| Analytics trackers | None | Google Analytics |
| Number of online tools | 113 | 39, PDF focused |
| Audio, video and ebook tools | Yes | No |
| AI tools | YesSummarize, translate | YesCopilot chat over PDFs |
| Desktop and mobile apps | NoWeb only | YesWindows, Mac, iOS, Android |
| Works offline | No | YesDesktop apps process locally |
Where PDFgear is strong
- Full desktop PDF editors for Windows and Mac, free, that work offline so files stay on your machine.
- Mobile apps for iOS and Android.
- An AI copilot that lets you chat with a PDF, included free.
- A few online tools that run entirely in the browser with no upload at all.
- A 4.9 Trustpilot score from roughly ten thousand reviews, and strong press including PCMag's best-free-editor verdict.
Where PDFRaw is strong
- A published, enforced retention promise: files deleted two hours after upload, backed by three independent mechanisms. PDFgear says files are deleted after a short period without saying how long.
- No analytics or advertising trackers at all, and no privacy-policy clause reserving the right to add them.
- Free with no paid tier and nothing announced to become one. PDFgear's own pages say some of its features are planned to become paid.
- 113 tools including audio, video, image and ebook conversion and transcription.
- The same product on every platform, including Linux, where PDFgear has no desktop app.
How long does free last?
Today, PDFgear is free the way it says it is: no watermark, no account, no fee. The company is open about the mechanics, saying investment covers operational costs, and equally open about the plan: its own pages state that some advanced options, such as AI features that need cloud computing, will carry a fee, on a timeline not yet set. That is not a trap, it is a runway, and runways end somewhere.
PDFRaw is free with no paid tier and no announced plan to add one. We run the engines on our own hardware, which keeps the service cheap to operate. Nobody can promise the future, them or us, but nothing here is marked as becoming paid later.
Privacy and file handling
PDFgear's best privacy answer is its desktop apps, which process files locally and need no account; a handful of its online tools also run entirely in the browser. For files that do reach its servers, the company says they are deleted after a short period, but publishes no number. Its AI copilot sends document content to Microsoft's Azure OpenAI service with consent, and its site uses Google Analytics. In 2026 it also published an independent Cure53 security audit of its Windows app, which found no malicious functionality.
PDFRaw's online tools state the retention number plainly: every file is deleted two hours after upload, enforced by a storage lifecycle rule, a scheduled cleanup, and an expiry check on every download, with an immediate delete button on the result screen. Our AI tools likewise send document text to a large language model and retain nothing. We run no analytics or ad trackers, and our privacy policy does not keep a door open for them.
Tools and platforms
If you want an installed application, PDFgear wins by existing: real desktop editors on Windows and Mac and real mobile apps, all free, against our web-only product. Its online set covers the PDF essentials across 39 tools, and its copilot answering questions about a PDF is genuinely useful.
PDFRaw's 113 tools stay in the browser but go further afield: image conversion in every direction, audio and video conversion, compression and transcription, ebook formats, OCR, and AI summarizing and translation. On Linux, or on a locked-down machine where nothing can be installed, the web is the whole game and the comparison narrows to the browsers, where we field almost three times the tools.
Try it on a real file
No account, no watermark, and the file is deleted two hours after you upload it.
Which one should you use?
Choose PDFgear if
- You want a free installed editor on Windows or Mac that works offline.
- You work from a phone and want a real app.
- Chatting with a PDF is a feature you will actually use.
Choose PDFRaw if
- You want a stated, enforced deletion window for uploaded files.
- You prefer a service with no analytics trackers and no reserved right to add advertising.
- You work with audio, video, images or ebooks as well as PDFs.
- You are on Linux or cannot install software.
Frequently asked questions
Is PDFgear really free?
Yes, today: no watermarks, no account, no fee, funded by investment. The company's own pages say some advanced features are planned to become paid, with no timeline set. PDFRaw is free with no paid tier.
Is PDFgear safe?
The published evidence says yes: a Singapore-registered company, a member of the PDF Association, and an independent Cure53 audit of its Windows app in 2026 that found no malicious functionality. Its desktop apps process files locally, which is inherently private. Its online tools do not publish a specific retention window, which is our main criticism.
Does PDFgear have online tools like PDFRaw?
Yes, 39 of them, covering PDF editing, conversion, organizing and signing, and a few run entirely in your browser. PDFRaw's 113 online tools add audio, video, image and ebook conversion, transcription, and AI summarizing and translation.
Which has the better AI features?
Different ones. PDFgear's copilot chats with a PDF, answering questions about it inside the app. PDFRaw's AI tools summarize and translate documents in the browser, free, without an app or account. If you want conversation, theirs; if you want a summary or a translation as a file, ours.