Wondershare All-New PDFelement 7 Review (Pro Version)

Business • Nov.28, 2019

APDF is a Portable Document Format which you can store and share digitally. PDFs find application everywhere — from you college essays to your job application. Yes, there is no escape from PDFs.

But, what happens when you need to edit a PDF file?

Since PDFs are read-only documents that preserve the layout of a page, you cannot always edit them. However, with time, there has been a significant rise in the demand for editing PDFs as they have become an integral part of publishing.

You might often need to correct factual errors or to get rid of the typos in a PDF. You might need to add images and connotations, export it to other formats, or review it for structural changes. And when the need arises, you might find yourself stuck, with no default apps in your OS to do the job well enough.

Operating systems, by default, do not let you edit PDFs and republish them with desired changes. They do have a PDF viewer where you can highlight sentences and add comments to them. But to edit a PDF, you will often need a third-party application that does the job for you.

And this is where Wondershare’s PDFelement 7 steps in. It is built minimally and brings together the much-needed business features in an easy-to-use user interface.

What’s new in PDFelement 7?

PDFelement 6 did the job of editing PDFs pretty well. Now, the new update introduces a few tweaks around the user interface. It betters the usability of this highly-popular app while keeping everything that makes this app so great and efficient in the first place.

A redesigned user interface

The new update brings a handful of features, the most prominent of them being a workaround of the user interface of PDFelement 7. The new UI brings together minimalism with efficiency — it lets you achieve the same tasks with fewer clicks.

The tools and options are laid out well, group. They seem to fall in the right places, grouped into options. You do not get lost even if you are new to the app.

Easier collaboration

An essential part of editing a PDF is to retain elements of it and to convert it into Office files. PDFelement 7 lets you do just that. The newest version now comes with a full-featured word processor that lets you edit PDFs effectively.

With the new update, you do not have to compromise on the way you edit the texts — fonts, layouts? Yes, it has all!

It even lets you collaborate more effectively with your team. Editing, often, is a team job. You make the edits, send it across for review, get them to add and then edit them again. If editing is a multi-sided affair for you or your organization, then PDFelement 7 could be the tool for you.

It lets you quickly receive feedback from people so that you can have a more professional version of the file.

Document security

The new version of PDFelement 7 – an excellent alternative to Adobe Acrobat – lets you quickly apply for permissions by generating passwords. It even lets you black out a particular area of the text or the image for confidentiality.

Download a free trial of PDFelement 7

PDFelement 7 Overview: what’s in it for the users?

The app has plenty to offer along the lines of the user interface and in-app experience. However, before we get into that, let’s look at the various features of PDFelement 7 that you can enjoy.

1. Create, edit, and convert PDFs

If you are looking to create PDFs from image files, HTML, and Office files, then PDFelement 7 can take care of these.

It lets you create PDF documents straight from scratch. It’s comfortable with the well laid out user interface — just like creating a new word document in a word processor.

The selling point of PDFelement 7 is its ability to edit PDFs. With this app, you get the ability to edit PDF files with much ease and simplicity — just like you edit a word document. It lets you copy, cut, edit, move, insert new text and images and delete them.

It even lets you add, update, or remove backgrounds in PDFs.

Worried about spellings? Well, the app comes with spell check, which makes sure that your texts are error-free. Besides, you also get the option to add hyperlinks.

It also lets you strike through texts, underline, and highlight them within a PDF.

All these features combined, PDFelement 7 acts as a one-stop to all your PDF editing needs.

PDFelement 7 also comes with the option to convert PDF documents to other formats that can be edited.

That’s not the end — have many PDFs that need to be converted? Don’t worry! PDFelement 7 is empowered to save you the many steps by enabling batch conversion.

2. Create and edit forms

You get the option to fill forms directly within the PDF and even extract data from it. It comes as a great option as you do not have to manually copy-paste data from PDFs to Word document — a process which can otherwise be quite exhausting and cumbersome.

3. Secure your PDFs

Have a highly confidential document — something that you do not want to be accessed by everyone? With PDFelement 7, you can delete or redact sensitive information within the PDF, protect them with a password, and apply or validate digital signatures.

4. Optical Character Recognition

The OCR technology on PDFelement 7 lets you convert scanned images into editable texts while keeping the layout and formatting of the document in place.

Have a text in a different language? Worry not! PDFelement 7’s text recognition tool supports recognition and conversion of documents in more than 25 languages.

Pretty cool from global standards, isn’t it?

What’s it like to use the latest PDFelement 7?

When we started using PDFelement 7, the one wish that we had was to not get lost in its features.

The installer is also entirely secure, so in case your antivirus detects a threat with this app, you can feel free to disable threat on this app from your antivirus.

Our installation didn’t detect any problems with the installation and the process was entirely smooth, so the process was quite smooth. We downloaded the online installer and a single window without completed the installation without any hassle.

PDF edits simplified

Coming to how we felt while using the app, the first thing that caught our attention was how the many options inside the app were laid out. With so many features around, you might as well think that things could get a bit clumsy. However, that’s not the case with this app — at least we did not feel like it.

The several options and the tools that this app has to offer can be found both through the in-app options and the menu bar.

There’s a clean startup page where you are asked to open a PDF file as shown in the screen below. The startup page was appealing — like a neat and crisp start to the PDF-editing journey.

The recent files that you open are shown towards the left this very screen. The fonts are attractive and easy to read and the blue colour goes well with the white, making for an immersive landing page.

Once you choose a file, you move to the edit page, where all the options are laid out well. You click on one of them and it opens up, giving you more options under it on top of the page.

The app is similar to any other Office app — with menu bars, toolbars, and such.

However, the design on Mac is quite different. So if you are switching to and fro between a Mac and Windows, or just using it on a Mac, then you might take some time getting used to the features of the app.

We did test the app on Mac as well and found out that it doesn’t take too long to get used to it.

If you do want to open a particular file but want to create one, then you can do so by clicking on Create PDF.

There are numerous tools that you can use to explore certain features. Nothing pops up on the screen — it’s all well laid out with neat design, well-crafted buttons, and a big space where you can view the PDF file.

The focus here is clearly on editing, and the buttons seem to be designed to serve that very purpose.

It was easy for us to navigate through these options since it was all quite accessible. Thankfully, we were not bombarded with any pop ups or add offers. Phew!

On the edit page, we could choose the options such as add or edit comments and text. It was great to see that the text editing feature could identify text blocks in the PDF and so that we could edit it as a word document. We found the text editing feature simple to use. There’s a variety of fonts and images to choose from so that’s a plus point.

When you go to the edit image option, the app identifies images in the PDF. From there, you can delete it, replace it, crop it, and scale it. You can even add a new image. It’s simple and works so effectively with precision.

We tried playing around with the images a bit and it all worked perfectly — cutting and pasting them, rotating them, and everything else; even adding a new image worked in a flash!

The link feature lets you add links to the PDF files in the form of blocks. The tool also identifies all the links in the PDF. There, you can delete individual links or just move it around the document. We tested a PDF with a lot of links, and yes, we did not feel lost.

There are plenty of options if you want to change the layout of your PDF. On the right pane, you can even review comments, search through the documents, and access bookmarks. The pane adapts to the selected elements of the PDF and gives you options that operate around them.

You will only be able to see these bookmarks and comments if they are not added. So if you see them missing, don’t worry — go ahead and add them.

There was much to do with the PDF as well. We could zoom-in, zoom-out, search through the PDF, adjust the height, width and size, organize pages, access bookmarks, and do much more with just one click on the right side of the pane.

Now, that’s what you would want from the best PDF editor, won’t you?

Wait, there’s more — hang on! This app has more features to further increase your productivity.

We could perform a handful of additional operations with this app, such as performing OCR (more on that in the next section), add or edit background, watermark, header and footer, and more. These are grouped under the tools button of the left hand panel. There was also the option to batch convert PDFs, encrypt them, and combine them.

For people who love multitasking, do note that the app works perfectly in the split screen mode which comes with Windows and Mac. It narrows up and the page zooms out to fit the new layout of the page.

Perform OCR on Scanned PDF or images

We particularly liked the OCR feature — a tribute to all those countless hours spent at the xerox machine and the keyboard.

OCR has made our lives much more comfortable. Gone are the days when you manually have to type out texts. PDFelement 7’s OCR feature lets grasp texts out of documents in more than 25 languages!

With OCR at hand, you can convert any scanned document into a fully editable and searchable PDF file. Since the OCR technology works with numerous languages, you can reproduce documents with its Format intact. Yes, you can retain all those headers and footers, footnotes, captions, page numbering, and graphics.

You can change the downsample rate and the type of PDF you want to create — if you can search through it and edit it.

We found it much easier to choose the language and choose a page range — it turned out to be exactly the way we wanted, even the layout of the page remained intact.

There, you can add files in batches — feature which saves a lot of time.

Once the app identifies a scanned document, it prompts you if you would like to launch the OCR feature to read and convert the document. If you are using the OCR service for the first time, you might have to download and install an OCR library within the app.

After the OCR library is downloaded, the conversion is a walk in the park. It is surprisingly accurate and sharp. It saves you those countless hours that you would otherwise spend manually copying the content of the scanned document.

When the OCR conversion is completed, the text is categorized into boxes where you can edit the text. The text, text size, and the font group are automatically selected, so it becomes much easier to work around these scanned documents.

Besides, the highly minimalist design doesn’t make it look like you are doing something tedious. It is fast, sleek, user-friendly, and utterly smooth — almost a sweet bit that we, at this blog, like to cherish.

Another great thing that we noticed about the inbuilt OCR feature was that it worked better than the many free OCR services online. It was quicker, more accurate, and was well-integrated throughout the app for enhanced functioning.

Additional security features

Another PDFelement 7 feature that we liked was its ability to create, apply, and validate digital signatures. This feature applies to any document that you create, edit, or convert.

It is a great feature to have as you no longer have to run around the xerox machine, taking print outs of documents, signing them, and then scanning them back.

We just clicked on the tool and drew a box, and it is there that we could feed a signature.

Another essential PDFelement 7 feature is that you get to redact sensitive images and information from images — a feature which is quite useful when you are dealing with sensitive information.

You can also apply redaction to contact information, names, social security number, and more. What else — you can use the redaction feature alongside the search option to make the process even more efficient.

Just select the tool and highlight the text or images. Once you have made a selection, it will be redacted.

Playing around with forms

PDFs and forms do not make a great combination. In the absence of a PDF editor, you would have to draw out the tables in a word document and manually feed in the data. However, with PDFelement 7, you get to create forms inside the PDF.

When you click on the form button, you get various form options to customize your form. You can have it the way you like, with as many rows or columns you want.

The best part is that it automatically scans forms in a document, even scanned documents for that matter. This makes it much easier to retain forms from documents.

You also get the option to import and export forms, which means that the feature does not remain exclusive to the file you are working with, but can be easily integrated with other files for a shared and more collaborative experience.

Converting PDFs to other formats

Sometimes, you might need to convert existing formats to other formats or vice versa. PDFelement 7 lets you convert PDF documents from other formats into editable PDFs — basically to any format that you are comfortable working around.

Like we have mentioned before, there’s also an option to convert images into PDFs. What’s more? You can also apply OCR to this feature.

With the effortless conversion, PDFelement 7 is one such app which you can use for any document. It brings all of them together for a more custom and easily adaptable interface.

The whole layout to convert documents is easy to use and doesn’t come with dialogue boxes that will trigger confusion.

Is PDfelement 7 reliable?

Well, yes!

PDFelement 7 happens to be quite reliable. If you looking for a PDF editor or PDF reader which is ad-free and comes with tools that can help you edit and play around with PDFs, then this should be your go-to option.

Since this app is also available on iOS and Android, you can easily edit on the go.

Talking about the bugs, well, we did not face any bugs in the app. From navigation to tools, everything was smooth.

We used it to edit a PDF and we were surprised at how easy it was to make the edits, save the file, and then later convert it into a file format of our choice — each of these operations could be performed with a few simple and easy steps.

The best part? Well, the options are not hidden — a couple of minutes into the app and you will know how each of these features work.

Support for PDFelement 7

One of the things that make an app great is the support it has. In the first place, we found out that it was not easy to get lost inside the app.

If you did manage to get lost, there’s an entire knowledge base on the internet that can help you with several queries. There are also several tutorial videos on YouTube that can help you with things.

However, if you find yourself stuck with nowhere to go, or if you have a problem with your license, then you can always get in touch with the Wondershare team. They respond promptly and help you with your queries without any hassle.

PDFelement pricing

Wondershare PDFelement 7 comes in two versions: PDFelement Standard and PDFelement Pro.

The monthly plan for the standard version comes at $6.99, whereas the Pro plan comes at $9.99.

There is also a quarterly and annual plan available. The quarterly plan for the Standard and Pro version stand at $19 and $29, whereas the annual plan happens to be at $59 and &89 respectively.

There are significant differences between these two versions. The Standard version of PDFelement 7 lets you create and edit PDFs, fill forms, convert your files to other formats, secure and sign them, as well as export them to Word, Excel, or PowerPoint.

The PDFelement Premium, on the other hand, lets you do all of these and more. It also gives you access to OCR and other features such as turning scanned documents into PDFs, compress them, adding headers and footers, numbering, batch processing, adding digital signature, and more.

If you are going to use this app for personal use — just creating and editing PDFs — then it’s recommended that you get hold of the Standard version. The Pro version, however, will work for all industry and organizational needs.

Team and Education plans are also available. You can find out more about the pricing of these plans here.

Wondershare also provides a 30-day trial version for those who want to try before they buy.

What about a free trial?

The app comes with a trial version, but it does not let you explore the features of the app to its fullest. It comes with certain limitations. However, there is a 30-day money-back guarantee which applies to your purchase. So if you are not satisfied with the app, you can easily opt for a refund.

The team at Wondershare will take a look into the matter and issue a refund.

Pros and Cons of PDFelement 7

Pros that are a win-win

Great design and easy to use interface
A handful of interesting tools
Good support with a forum

Cons that you might experience

Switching between Windows to Mac or vice versa may take time
No fully-featured, limitations-free trial version for individuals

Final words: should you buy PDFelement 7?

Well, any day, we’d give a 5-star review to the product. So yes, if you are someone who deals with PDFs quite regularly and has to make changes to them, then this app should be your go-to option.

Besides, if you run and organization or an educational institution, then it is highly likely that you will have to deal with large volumes of files. If that’s the case, then PDFelement 7 is one software that you could rest all your PDF needs at.

It’s also a great option if you’re hunting for an Adobe Acrobat alternative.

At PDFelement 7, you will find plenty of sweetness, much craft, and a support team dedicated to helping you through your journey with the app.