Sign a PDF
Sign a PDF without printing it.
Draw your signature once, place it on the signing line, fill in the rest of the form, and export. It happens in this browser tab — the document is never uploaded, there is no account, no watermark and no page limit.
Electronic or digital? They are not the same thing
People use the two words interchangeably and they mean different things. Which one you need is worth two minutes before you sign anything.
Electronic signature — what this does
Your handwritten mark, drawn with a mouse, finger or stylus, placed where you want it on the page. This is what people mean by “signing a PDF” almost every time they say it, and it is what a landlord, a school, a clinic, an employer or a counterparty is normally asking for. It carries the same weight as signing a printed copy and scanning it back — and it is legible, tightly cropped and correctly placed, which a phone photo of a signed page usually is not.
Digital signature — what this does not do
A cryptographic signature: a certificate issued to you by a trusted authority, bound to the document by a hash, so any later change to the file invalidates it and a reader can display who signed and when. That needs a private key and a certificate authority, neither of which exists inside a browser tab. If a form specifically requires a digital or certificate-based signature — some government filings and regulated corporate workflows do — this is not the tool for it, and you should use software your organisation has issued you.
How it works
- 1
Open the PDF
Drop the file into the editor. It is read in your browser; nothing is sent anywhere.
- 2
Draw your signature
Mouse, finger or stylus. A touchscreen gives the most convincing result.
- 3
Place it on the line
Drop it where it belongs and resize it to fit. Place it again wherever initials are needed.
- 4
Fill in the rest of the form
The field scan turns embedded fields, drawn boxes and ruled lines into things you can type into.
- 5
Export
Download a normal PDF with selectable text and the same pages you started with.
What you get
- Nothing is uploaded
- The document is opened and re-exported in your browser. There is no server that receives it and no account. Unsaved work disappears when the tab closes; if you explicitly choose Save on this device, the PDF and editor layers are kept in local IndexedDB until you delete them or the browser clears site data. Passwords are never saved. That matters more for signing than for almost anything else: a signed document usually carries your name, address, account numbers and now your signature, all in one file.
- Your signature has no paper-colored background
- Newly drawn signatures are normalized vector strokes, so there is no background rectangle at all. Legacy bitmap signatures remain supported with a real alpha channel. Either format sits on the signing line rather than covering it with the grey or white rectangle a photographed signature often brings.
- Draw once, place it as many times as the form needs
- Long agreements ask for initials on every page and a full signature at the end. Draw it once and place it wherever it is needed, resizing each placement to fit the line it sits on.
- The rest of the form is fillable too
- A local scan reads the form fields already embedded in the PDF, the boxes and underlines drawn in the page, and the labels in the text, then merges them into editable fields. So you fill in the date, the address and the reference number in the same pass, instead of signing a document you had to print to complete.
- It exports as a normal PDF
- Selectable text stays selectable, the page count and page sizes are unchanged, and the file opens anywhere. You can then add a password with the protect tool if you are sending it by email.
What it will not do
- No certificate, no tamper-evidence
- As above: this is an electronic signature, not a certificate-backed digital one. Nothing in the exported file proves the signature was made by you, and nothing detects a later edit. That is true of a scanned wet signature too, which is why both are accepted in the same everyday situations and neither is accepted where a certificate is specifically required.
- New signatures are vector strokes; legacy images still work
- A signature drawn now is stored as normalized strokes and exported as vector lines, so it stays sharp when resized. Older transparent bitmap signature records remain supported for compatibility and keep their original resolution limits. Neither format is a certificate-backed digital signature.
- No audit trail, no countersigning, no sending
- There is no workflow here: no email invitations, no signing order, no certificate of completion, no record of who opened what and when. If you need any of that, you need a signature service, not a PDF editor. This signs a document you already have and hands it back to you.
- Cover is recoverable; Remove rasterizes the page
- Cover paints over an area while leaving the underlying PDF content recoverable. Remove makes that covered content absent from the exported page by rasterizing the page, which also removes selectable text, links, form fields, annotations, and tags there. Neither mode is a certified redaction workflow, so inspect the exported file before sharing sensitive material.
Questions
- How do I electronically sign a PDF for free?
- Open the PDF in the editor, choose the signature tool, draw your signature once, and place it on the signing line. Export the file when you are done. There is no account, no watermark, no page limit and no cost, because the work happens in your browser rather than on a server someone has to pay for.
- Is an electronic signature legally binding?
- In most everyday contexts, yes — an electronic signature generally carries the same weight as signing a printed copy by hand. Rules differ by country and by document type, and some categories (wills and certain property or family-law instruments are the usual examples) are excluded or need extra formalities. This is general information rather than legal advice; if the document matters, check what it or your jurisdiction requires.
- What is the difference between an electronic and a digital signature?
- An electronic signature is your mark on the document — the handwritten signature this tool places. A digital signature is a cryptographic construct: a certificate issued to you, bound to the file, that identifies the signer and makes later edits detectable. This tool does electronic signatures only. If a form asks specifically for a digital or certificate-based signature, use software your organisation has issued you.
- Do I need to print and scan the document?
- No, and that is most of the point. Printing and scanning costs you a printer, a scanner, and a grey, skewed, hard-to-read copy of a document that started out crisp. Signing it in place keeps the text selectable and the pages exactly as they were.
- Is my document uploaded anywhere?
- No. It is opened, edited and re-exported inside your browser tab. There is no upload, no account and no stored copy. You can confirm it by signing a document with your network disconnected — everything still works.
- Can I sign a password-protected PDF?
- Yes, if you know the password. Enter it when the file is opened and the document is decrypted in memory; it is never sent anywhere. If you do not have the password, no tool can legitimately open it for you.
- Can I add my initials to every page?
- Yes. Draw your initials as a signature and place a copy on each page that needs one, resizing to fit. There is no per-page or per-document limit.
- Can I sign on a phone or tablet?
- Yes, and a touchscreen is usually the best way to do it — a signature drawn with a finger or stylus looks far more like your real one than a signature drawn with a mouse.
Before and after signing
Need to combine the signature page back into the full agreement? Use merge. Sending it on? Add a password with protect. Only a few pages need signing? Split them out first. Starting from nothing at all — an agreement you still have to write — build it here and sign it in the same session.