# PDFsam review (2026): is the free plan enough? > Split and merge PDFs offline, with paid Visual and Enhanced editions Checked Nov 12, 2026 ยท graded Nov 12, 2026 by ToolGPA. PDFsam is a family of desktop PDF apps. PDFsam Basic is free and open source and splits, merges, extracts, rotates and mixes pages. PDFsam Visual adds more than 25 page tools for Windows, macOS and Linux, and PDFsam Enhanced is a separate Windows-only editor with OCR, forms and signing. All work offline. - **Category:** PDF Editors - **Made by:** Sober Lemur S.r.l. (since 2006) - **Website:** https://pdfsam.org - **Runs on:** Windows, macOS, Linux - **Who should skip it:** Not for you if you need to edit text inside a PDF, as Basic and Visual work on pages and files. - **Facts last checked:** Nov 12, 2026 ## Pricing As of Nov 12, 2026, PDFsam has a free plan, and paid plans start at $34.90 per user / year (PDFsam Visual); PDFsam Basic is free. - **Pricing model:** Free plan - **Free plan:** PDFsam Basic is free and open source, with no watermarks or limits, for splitting, merging, extracting, rotating and mixing PDFs. - **Free trial:** 14-day free trial of PDFsam Visual with all tools, no credit card required. | Plan | Price | What you get | | --- | --- | --- | | PDFsam Basic | $0 | Free, open-source app to split, merge, extract, rotate and mix PDFs on Windows, macOS and Linux. | | PDFsam Visual subscription | $34.90 per user / year, recurring billing | 25+ page tools including compress, crop and metadata cleaning, with unlimited upgrades; 2 computers per user. | | PDFsam Visual perpetual | $59.00 one-time purchase per user | The same Visual tools without a subscription, with unlimited minor upgrades; 2 computers per user. | | PDFsam Enhanced Standard | $69 per user / year | Windows-only PDF editor, with free upgrades and support; 2 computers per user. | | PDFsam Enhanced Pro | $89 per user / year | A higher Windows edition of Enhanced; the page does not spell out how it differs from Standard. | | Enhanced Pro + OCR Advanced | $129 per user / year | Top Windows edition of Enhanced, with the advanced OCR option. | Read from https://pdfsam.org/download-pdfsam-visual/ on Nov 12, 2026. Prices change, so confirm with PDFsam before buying. ## Ways to pay less - **40% off for students, nonprofits and teachers** (Education): Students, nonprofits and public school teachers can get PDFsam Visual's Education plan at 40% off; the page shows $20.94 against $34.90. Source: https://pdfsam.org/download-pdfsam-visual/ - **Volume discounts on 5+ Enhanced licenses** (Other savings): PDFsam says it offers volume discounts on five or more PDFsam Enhanced licenses, through its sales team. Source: https://pdfsam.org/download-pdfsam-enhanced/ ## Key features - **Merge and split:** Basic merges PDFs with bookmarks and forms, and splits by page numbers, bookmark level or file size. - **Extract, rotate and mix:** Keep only the pages you need, rotate all or some pages, and interleave pages from two files for single-sided scans. - **Visual page organizer:** Visual lets you drag and drop pages from several PDFs to rearrange, delete, crop, resize or compress them. - **Clean and protect:** Visual removes metadata and annotations, flattens forms and encrypts files with AES 256. - **Full editor on Windows:** Enhanced edits, annotates, fills forms, converts to Office formats, runs OCR and signs PDFs. - **Works offline:** Files stay on your computer: Basic and Visual need no internet connection and upload nothing. ## Good for - People who only need to split or merge PDFs and want it free - Mac and Linux users who want page tools without a subscription - Buyers who want a one-time license instead of a yearly fee ## Worth knowing - Only Basic is free; Visual's trial ends after 14 days, though merge, mix and two split tools stay free. - PDFsam Enhanced, the full editor with OCR and forms, is for Windows only; Mac and Linux users get Visual. - Basic and Visual work on pages and files; they do not edit text inside a PDF. - Visual's perpetual license includes minor upgrades only; free upgrades are tied to the subscription. ## ToolGPA grades **GPA: 3.0 out of 4**, graded Nov 12, 2026. PDFsam Basic is a free, open source program that splits, merges, extracts, rotates and mixes PDFs offline. It does not edit text inside a PDF, and the visual and editor editions are paid. - **Value for money: A.** PDFsam Basic is free and open source, with no watermarks or limits. - **Free plan and trial: A.** Basic is free outright and has no cap a normal person reaches; paid Visual and Enhanced are separate. - **Features: C.** Merge, split, extract, rotate and mix, done fully, but that is a smaller job than editing: it does not change text inside a PDF. - **Ease of use: B.** No rating on record; a program you install and use, with nothing to set up. - **Platforms and integrations: C.** Windows, Mac and Linux, which are computers only. No phone or web version. These are ToolGPA's own grades. Graded from this listing, whose facts were read from Sober Lemur S.r.l.'s own pages on 12 November 2026. Not based on using the product, and shorter than our full reviews. ## Where it stands among PDF editors - PDFsam's GPA of 3.0 is higher than 23 of the 28 other PDF editors we grade, and level with 3. - It stands best on free plan and trial (A, above 25 of 28) and worst on features (C, above 0). - Its paid plans start at $2.91 a month when paid by the year for each person, against a middle price of $6.33 for the category: 1 of the 19 others that charge start lower. - On features, ease of use and platforms it scores 2.3 out of 4. 2 tools score higher and cost less. The category's chart of price against score: https://toolgpa.com/charts/pdf-editors ## Keep it, or make your own? **Keep it.** Nothing PDFsam does is plain enough to make in a weekend. The 3 things listed below take a company. It is one of the better ones too: its GPA of 3.0 is higher than 23 of the 28 other PDF editors we grade. It costs $34.90 a year. PDFsam is open source, so there is a third way: take its code and run it yourself. - You could not: Editing the text inside a PDF without breaking its layout. - You could not: Apps for macOS, Windows and Linux that stay in step with each other. - You could not: It is priced for each person, which means accounts and billing for a team. A judgement by ToolGPA from this listing, by rules that are the same for every tool. Nothing was built to test it. **Tags:** PDF editing, Open source, Works offline, One-time purchase ## Alternatives - [PDF24 Tools](https://toolgpa.com/tools/pdf24): Free online PDF tools paid for by ads, plus an offline Windows app. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/pdf24-vs-pdfsam) - [Sejda](https://toolgpa.com/tools/sejda): Web and desktop PDF tools, free within daily limits or by the week. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/pdfsam-vs-sejda) - [PDFgear](https://toolgpa.com/tools/pdfgear): Free PDF editor for desktop, mobile and web with an AI copilot. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/pdfgear-vs-pdfsam) - [Stirling PDF](https://toolgpa.com/tools/stirling-pdf): Open-source PDF editor you can run on your own machine or server. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/pdfsam-vs-stirling-pdf) - [PDF-XChange Editor](https://toolgpa.com/tools/pdf-xchange-editor): Windows PDF editor with a free edition and perpetual licenses. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/pdf-xchange-editor-vs-pdfsam) ## Sources The prices, plans, platforms and features above were read from these pages on Nov 12, 2026: - https://pdfsam.org/download-pdfsam-visual/ - https://pdfsam.org/download-pdfsam-enhanced/ - https://pdfsam.org Page: https://toolgpa.com/tools/pdfsam Listed by ToolGPA (toolgpa.com).