Nitro PDF Pro review

Update: This review is for an older version.
For the latest release, see our Nitro PDF Pro 13 review.  

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With so many PDF editors on the market right now, finding the right deal can be a bit tricky. There are many points to consider, and not all of them are immediately obvious if you’ve never used a tool like this before and don’t know what you’re supposed to be looking for in the first place. Some editors are aimed at advanced users who need lots of different features, while others are relatively light on the feature front and are instead meant to provide an easy, convenient to use package that doesn’t take a lot of time to get started with.

Nitro PDF Pro is trying to provide a reasonable middle ground that offers the best of both worlds. The program is quite rich in features, and offers a variety of different tools to help you tweak your PDF documents to your liking. At the same time, it’s one of the easiest PDF editors to get started with, and it’s designed to be very intuitive for beginners, not just for experts with a lot of experience under their belt. That doesn’t make Nitro PDF Pro any less powerful than its competitors though – quite the opposite, this is one of the most advanced editors on the market at the moment in some regards.

Plans and pricing

Nitro PDF Pro is a premium product and doesn’t have a free version – though a limited free trial is provided, offering enough features to provide a good introduction into the capabilities of the application as a whole. The default Windows version costs $179.99 per user per year, and there’s no option to pay in monthly installments. There are, however, discounts for purchasing more than one license, making this a good tool for business users who need multiple seats.

There’s a Mac version available for a lower price – typically around $50 less, though this can vary throughout the year. That version of Nitro PDF Pro is sold as PDFPen, but it offers a similar set of features. The discount levels are different for the Mac version too, requiring a larger number of subscriptions before a discount is triggered. 

Features

Most of Nitro PDF Pro’s features are pretty standard. The program allows users to perform various kinds of regular edits, including inserting, modifying and deleting text and objects from pages, cutting out entire pages, changing the layout of a specific page, converting between different formats, and filling out forms. Secure options are also available, including the ability to sign a document electronically.

Nitro PDF Pro is particularly good when it comes to customizing a document, with various predefined edits, and the ability to create and save custom commands. The program works great in situations where users need to frequently perform a specific set of edits that don’t change much from one iteration to the next.

Interface and in use

Nitro PDF Pro features a clean, familiar user interface that should feel very comfortable to those coming from Microsoft Office. The ribbon-style UI provides quick access to all important features at a glance, and everything else is exactly where you’d expect to find it. The editor can surprise with its range of features compared to the initial impression it creates, as many users initially assume that it’s just a simple editor with a few minor features under the hood. Which, in the end, speaks volumes for the great UI design of the application. 

Support

Nitro PDF Pro’s support is good overall, though the company doesn’t offer any live chat options. You can use the knowledge base or submit a support ticket, in which case you’ll have to wait for someone to get back to you. However, support representatives tend to respond relatively fast to most inquiries, and they are clearly competent about their product, understanding its intricate aspects in detail. You can expect most questions to be answered relatively fast, including more complex ones that require additional attention.

The competition

Some of the main competitors of Nitro PDF Pro include Foxit PDF Editor, PDFElement and Adobe Acrobat. For its asking price however, Nitro PDF Pro easily manages to stand out as one of the best offers on the market. The program leaves very little to be desired, especially for those who already have some experience with PDF editors and know what they are looking for.

Final verdict

Nitro PDF Pro is one of the most advanced PDF editors on the market right now, and it offers an impressive range of features compared to most of its competitors. The program doesn’t take long to get used to at all, and is offered at a very reasonable price. It runs well on slower devices, and is one of the most reliable editors in its class on the market. The only major downsides are the lack of a monthly subscription and live chat support, but most users would probably not care much about those in the first place. Nitro PDF Pro is clearly aimed at business users to some extent, so having to pay annually should not be a problem for most. 

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