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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Adobe Acrobat

    Score8.8 out of 10
    N/AAdobe Acrobat DC is the current version of the well-established document / PDF management solution, part of the Adobe Document Cloud (the other part being Adobe's eSign services based on technology acquired with EchoSign in 2011).

    $29.99

    per month per seat

    Adobe InDesign

    Score8.9 out of 10
    N/AAdobe InDesign supports creating digital and print documents such as flyers, stationary, posters, and other types of media, with rich graphics, images, and more. Adobe InDesign is available standalone or as part of the Adobe Creative Suite collection of media management and creation products.

    $31.49

    per month

    Pricing
    Adobe AcrobatAdobe InDesign
    Editions & Modules
    Acrobat Pro for Individuals
    $19.99
    per month
    Acrobat Pro for Teams
    $23.99
    per month per user
    Acrobat Studio for Individuals
    $24.99
    per month
    Monthly Plan
    $31.49
    per month
    Annual Plan, Prepaid
    $239.88 ($19.99)
    per year (per month)
    Annual Plan, Paid Monthly
    $251.88 ($20.99)
    per year (per month)
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Adobe AcrobatAdobe InDesign
    Free Trial
    YesNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    YesNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Adobe AcrobatAdobe InDesign
    Considered Both Products
    Adobe
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    I would say that Adobe Acrobat DC is the easiest to use among Adobe PhotoShop, Adobe InDesign, and Adobe Illustrator because it does not require any complex training or experience with the software beforehand. Similar to Microsoft Word, it is an easy-to-understand interface …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    This isn't really a good comparison, but Adobe Acrobat is more of a program that works among all of these, and I'll keep using it as long as it's a part of Adobe CC. Otherwise, I see DocuSign as suitable for secure/private documents, and Dropbox file previews allows a pretty …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    We use all Adobe products. Adobe is the industry standard. I appreciate that they are constantly improving their products.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    PDF readers allow you to access PDF files, but that is a bare minimum in my work and not sufficient for my needs when preparing content, adapting it, or even combining content into new PDF files. I've not encountered any application that works as well or intuitively as Adobe …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    Acrobat is the standard. Why consider any other?
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    There's not really anything I've used before that's similar to Acrobat.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    I would say Acrobat is more user-friendly, especially for those who aren't super tech savvy or doesn't have access to Adobe programs.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    Not applicable, we haven't used any alternatives.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    I prefer Adobe Acrobat to Bluebeam because it has the functionality that I need and because I use so many other Adobe products, it's an easy transition for me. Bluebeam is much more cumbersome and really just has more construction-focused functionality that I don't need on a …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    SignNow works well too, but Adobe Acrobat fits better since we use so many other Adobe products to conduct our business. It's easier to stay within one system rather than jumping between platforms. It's also nice to avoid paying two subscription fees and instead staying with …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    Honestly, Adobe is the only company I think of when it comes to anything having to do with the Portable Document Format. I have tried a couple other more "simple" apps over the years for specific functions, but they paled in comparison. So much so that I do not recall the names …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    Illustrator and InDesign are necessary for creating the content we turn into PDFs, but Acrobat is useful for combining pages from multiple teams, sometimes from documents created from disparate programs. It's also a more widely used program, so we can trust that our internal …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    It doesn't stack up AGAINST...it compliments. It's a worthy peer and integral extension of all the other software we use.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    I have used other PDF editors through the years to test them against Acrobat, but Acrobat always wins due to the amount of usable features that it offers, as well as ease of use. Aside from Reader, I don't remember the names of the other software unfortunately.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    All of Adobes products work cohesively together making projects seamless. Adobe Acrobat DC is my go-to software to share files and documents with others that I know don't have access to more involved Adobe platforms such as InDesign or Illustrator. I know that users will be …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    I find it easier to edit and read pdfs in Adobe Acrobat.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    For now, I use Adobe CC so it's part of that package for me. I have not really had any reason to look at other platforms all that much. I know that Microsoft Office has its own version of a PDF publisher that seems to work very similarly to Adobe. Other than these I am not …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    All are robust software packages. I can say that I am nowhere near scratching the surface of what these products will do. Their functionality is somewhat intuitive and you can seamlessly switch from one package to another when creating and editing documents. This holds true for …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    Adobe Acrobat DC is easier to use and more intuitive than BlueBeam, we prefer Bluebeam for operations teams because it offers to scale and measuring for construction documents that our operations teams need, however, would prefer the Adobe suite for ease of use, and familiarity …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe Acrobat
    I don't use Bluebeam, but many of my coworkers do - particularly when it comes to construction plans and surveys. They tend not to use Adobe Acrobat DC as much, sticking to Bluebeam for everything, but because they have the software they do not have difficulty using Adobe …
    Incentivized
    Adobe
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    Adobe InDesign, QuarkXPress and Affinity Publisher work similarly in the big picture. The newest on the market, Affinity Publisher takes many cues from its predecessors but still remains a less sleek product. Still, I use Publisher on my own and find it to have great …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    I've only ever used Quark but not for years. But InDesign is a much better product.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    I have used proprietary composition web applications at other publishers, and I have used Quark (which is less powerful/feature-rich) and LaTeX (which is great for what it does but is not right for all projects). I prefer InDesign for its universality. It can be used on just …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    So basically, we just use Word Docs, generated PDFs from them, and combined them all into the reader. We decided to move to InDesign, because we were working with a graphic designer and it made a lot more sense to have an entire rebrand that read and felt differently. InDesign …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    We can use AI to make catalog or sellsheets too, but it can not compete with [Adobe] InDesign, AI is useful for single page stuff, but it's a bit heavy while carries more pages and more links. While we are doing some artworks, we prefer to use AI, but once it has few more …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    Microsoft products do not match the aesthetic tools that [Adobe] InDesign offers, cannot support the customizable options available for export, and do not produce documents with as high a degree of accessibility. That said, they do have their place in collaboration in a team- …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    Adobe InDesign is a much different platform for document creation and publishing compared to Adobe PhotoShop. With Photoshop your goal is to start with or create an image and make all modifications and adjustments within that program. InDesign takes those finished images and …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    InDesign is much more user friendly and is compatible with other Adobe products. InDesign is more versatile and more widely used. Compatibility with other designers, agencies, and promo companies makes work and collaboration easier.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    Adobe InDesign is easier for me to use and has more features. When teaching myself how to use the software, I was able to find more videos online for helpful tips.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    InDesign had more features and flexibility many years ago when I learned how to use it, and compared to Quark, I found it to be a better product and haven't gone back since.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    The two big guns in page layout software are InDesign and Quark Express. At one time, Quark was the go-to software. A majority of Pre Press shops employed Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, and Quark Express. Over the years, though, InDesign has surpassed Quark.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    Adobe InDesign is much more intuitive, has much more advanced tools, and is fully integrated with Adobe's other image and graphics editing software. It works better with text distribution and combining text with images. It provides better dynamic resources for a more …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    First, Microsoft products are notoriously difficult to work with, so the bar is already set pretty low. In my limited experience with MS Publisher in the past, the tools were not intuitive and the files did not save / share well outside of MS platforms. It has been many years …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    InDesign fits in perfectly with the Adobe Creative Suite and really works hand in hand with the other applications.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    I can’t offer a fair comparison between Adobe InDesign and the other software mentioned above because I have used Adobe InDesign the most and have only used the others one or two times.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    Publisher is something that we as an organization used to use at the beginning phase of our organization, and, as we grew and the team grew bigger and the needs increased, we needed a more professional tool. That's where Adobe InDesign came in. With Publisher, there was limited …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    I use InDesign to incorporate these other two programs. Illustrator and Photoshop are used for creating graphics and images, and I am able to place them into my working InDesign file to create a more visually pleasing proposal. One thing that InDesign does better is allow you …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    I used Quark for over 4 years professionally prior to InDesign coming out, but all I can do is compare it to the original InDesign of 1999/2000. We exclusively use InDesign for multi-page layouts currently. Since it's the most recognizable industry format, we don't bother with …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    Not fully integrated with Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator. We used Quark before we migrated to InDesign. Users don't want to go back, mostly because of hte tight integrations with the Adobe products. Even our freelancers and vendors use InDesign and would not go back to Qu…
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    Until the development of InDesign, I was a faithful user of QuarkXPress. I knew Quark like the back of my hand. Once I decided to make the change, I realized how robust InDesign was compared to "old faithful." It took a little time to learn the nuances. Now, I can't imagine …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    If you use the Adobe Suite you must use InDesign. Quark will work as a good standalone product, but my experience was that there are more available users and support for InDesign. Quark is an inferior product.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    We currently have no found any software that comes close to the power of InDesign. There are many very generic softwares that only allow the simplest of design. They do not offer the level of freedom and creation that InDesign allows. While more complex, this allows you much …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    InDesign is the best page layout program on the market. Honestly I have been using it so long without needing other layout programs that I would not even know what competes with it. At first I was hesitant about it now having to be subscription-based but that is actually a good …
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    Adobe InDesign is afar and away the best product I have used - alone or as a suite of products - in my production environment.
    Incentivized
    Chose Adobe InDesign
    InDesign stacks up nicely with its other Adobe Creative Suite counterparts. Like InDesign, Photoshop and Illustrator are the industry standard. They all have so many features that it can be daunting to learn especially if you don't use it every day. What I like best about Adobe …
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    98%
    Would buy again
    487 Answers
    100%
    Would buy again
    82 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    95%
    Delivers good value for the price
    423 Answers
    96%
    Delivers good value for the price
    73 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    98%
    Happy with the feature set
    486 Answers
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    82 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    98%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    341 Answers
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    68 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    99%
    Implementation went as expected
    372 Answers
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    71 Answers
    Best Alternatives
    Adobe AcrobatAdobe InDesign
    Small Businesses
    M‑Files
    Score8.9 out of 10
    Affinity Publisher
    Score8.1 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Esker
    Score10 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    Enterprises
    Tungsten Capture
    Score8 out of 10
    No answers on this topic
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Adobe AcrobatAdobe InDesign
    Likelihood to Recommend
    9.1
    (481 ratings)
    8.8
    (98 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    9.7
    (26 ratings)
    10.0
    (3 ratings)
    Usability
    9.3
    (237 ratings)
    7.8
    (8 ratings)
    Availability
    10.0
    (2 ratings)
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    Performance
    8.1
    (8 ratings)
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    7.8
    (56 ratings)
    5.0
    (64 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    Online Training
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    9.6
    (9 ratings)
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    Configurability
    8.5
    (2 ratings)
    8.0
    (1 ratings)
    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    6.0
    (3 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    9.0
    (8 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    10.0
    (2 ratings)
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    4.0
    (3 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    5.5
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Adobe AcrobatAdobe InDesign
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Adobe
    The 12 primary users represent our core Human Resources, Payroll, and Finance operations teams. Within this group, HR managers use the platform to oversee employee lifecycle events, handle benefits administration, and process new-hire onboarding. The payroll specialists and finance staff manage bi-weekly payroll runs, direct deposits, tax compliance, and general ledger reporting. Additionally, a couple of operational team leads use administrative access to approve timesheets, track attendance, and monitor departmental PTO accruals.
    Read full review
    Adobe
    Adobe InDesign is very well-suited to creating professional-looking page designs. If you want a newspaper or magazine to have attractive pages that go beyond simple templates, InDesign is the best option out there, to my knowledge. It's less suited to scenarios where people without page design skills are responsible for creating pages, as it requires some training and skills to use effectively.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Adobe
    • For the business account, the Adobe Acrobat rep assigned to your account will actively look for ways to save you money.
    • We have found that our rep from Adobe Acrobat Business Account reviews our usage and related apps and has offered helpful tips on better ways to complete tasks we historically undertake with their software. They have saved us a great deal of time and money. They make us efficient.
    • The apps they offer that combine with the primary program are relevant to the tasks our business performs, and they function at a high level and never fail. It's really quite remarkable.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Adobe
    • Customization - With Adobe InDesign, as well as many other applications in the Adobe Creative Suite, I can fully customize my workspaces and save different workspaces. This makes it easy to navigate through my project and have the panels and tools I need easily accessible and configured based on my project needs.
    • Styles - Adobe InDesign has character styles, object styles, and tables styles. This speeds up my workflows and allows me to easily apply the same format across multiple elements. This is super helpful, especially when working with length documents.
    • File compatibility - I can easily export my files into so many different file types.
    • The Book feature - This feature is really helpful when creating books or very long documents with multiple sections.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Adobe
    • Fonts can default (but not always) if the designer doesn't perform due diligence before generating PDFs.
    • The one area Adobe Acrobat is not good at: generating PDFs straight from a website. The results are touch-and-go.
    • The basic nav controls take a little getting used to. What I initially expected to be in one spot could only be found elsewhere.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Adobe
    • Not naturally a WYSIWYG display (this is an option, and doesn't always work as intended)
    • Moving images and photos around while holding an additional key
    • Layers or objects are not easily clickable behind other objects.
    • Adobe InDesign does require some fair system resources to work smoothly
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Adobe
    Option 1: Cross-Departmental MixThe 12 Adobe Acrobat users in our organization represent several key business functions across operations:Legal & Compliance (3 users): Redact confidential information, review terms, and handle legally binding e-signatures for contracts.Finance (3 users): Consolidate financial statements, convert spreadsheets into secure PDFs, and process vendor invoices.Human Resources (2 users): Manage fillable onboarding paperwork, store confidential employee records, and distribute company policies.Sales (2 users): Send out client proposals, track service agreements, and capture executive signatures.Marketing (2 users): Review collateral proofs, combine media packages, and optimize PDF sizes for web distribution.
    Read full review
    Adobe
    I've had great experiences with the product and plan to continue to use it. It has been my go-to product for designing and creating materials. I have had great luck with it and have been able to create all of the needed marketing materials that have been requested for our company.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Usability
    Adobe
    The features on the desktop version are all toolbar based, which makes it a little more cumbersome on a smaller device (and much simpler on a large screen). The web forms adjust well to different screen size so work well on mobile, tablet and computer
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Adobe
    If you know what you are doing it is an amazingly granular and powerful application. You can control pretty much any aspect of the design and layout of your documents and make changes globally and rapidly. But, if you don't know what you are doing...you will be staring at your screen in bewilderment for a long time. You can learn it, but be ready for a hefty time investment.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    Adobe
    We have not had availability issues with Adobe Acrobat, or at least none that I am personally aware of. Some may encounter crashes of the software during outages of electricity in their city or neighborhood, which no one can plan for, but with generators in our organization, we have been lucky not to have outages
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Adobe
    I've needed Adobe InDesign team very little which is a bonus in and of itself.
    Read full review
    Performance
    Adobe
    One of the best features of Adobe Acrobat is its speed and stability. When dealing with massive multi-page files, having to reload a crashed program over and over again would slow down progress unnecessarily. And expanding on that, having the table of contents generated allows me to skip to different pages with ease, a necessary feature with exceptionally long files. word searches are even more helpful with text recognition.
    Incentivized
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    Adobe
    One of the advantages of Adobe InDesign is it is faster and less glitchy than Microsoft Word.
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Adobe
    For a while, Acrobat DC crashed pretty frequently. I contacted Adobe Acrobat support about the problem. At first support was unable to provide a solution. After about a month Adobe's software engineers provided a fix. I just wish it had taken less than a month to solve the problem.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Adobe
    Adobe support is ok but not great. Chat support often doesn't initially understand the question at-hand and it takes awhile to get to the right agent. Phone support has long wait times, and though I've had more luck there, it does take quite a time investment if you are looking for help. However, Adobe does have some online learning solutions available as well as a knowledgebase for frequently asked questions. If you're looking to learn how to use the platform, there are lots of resources which can typically be found in a few Google searches. If you have a technical issue with the system, that's going to be a bit more of a time investment as far as getting a tech's assistance to resolve the problem.
    Incentivized
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    In-Person Training
    Adobe
    No answers on this topic
    Adobe
    Attending Adobe MAX each year is extremely valuable.
    Incentivized
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    Online Training
    Adobe
    Easy to follow and understand
    Incentivized
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    Adobe
    The online training works well and is not wholly necessary as it is user-friendly and you can learn by doing.
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Adobe
    I was not involved with the implementation process, so I cannot answer this question. However, when it was installed on my computer system, they did so virtually. I just sat there while they took control of my computer over the network and watch them install it, lickety split
    Incentivized
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    Adobe
    Implementation was smooth and easy.
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    Alternatives Considered
    Adobe
    In my opinion, both complement each other. Microsoft clearly has with Copilot the AI Edge. However, the visual dynamics of Adobe Creative are Outstanding and provide a balanced approach to creativity, utilizing both Excellent, user-friendly Tools.
    Incentivized
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    Adobe
    Microsoft products do not match the aesthetic tools that [Adobe] InDesign offers, cannot support the customizable options available for export, and do not produce documents with as high a degree of accessibility. That said, they do have their place in collaboration in a team- I'd consider Office to be the first step and [Adobe] InDesign to be the final product.
    Incentivized
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    Contract Terms and Pricing Model
    Adobe
    The only thing I can think of that may be helpful would be a more flexible tiered pricing options based on usage or document volume.
    Incentivized
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    Adobe
    No answers on this topic
    Scalability
    Adobe
    I find that many users aren't aware of many features of the software they use, nor may they be comfortable with learning multiple-step processes. For the simplest of PDF purposes (scanning, downloading, exporting), it gets a thumbs-up. For anything involving electronic signatures, meh--causes eyes to glaze over, or forgetting what all is involved.
    Incentivized
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    Adobe
    Working in a cloud environment makes it easy to scale and share resources.
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    Return on Investment
    Adobe
    • Automation of contract offer generation enabled the HR team to reduce the time to process contracts by 97%.
    • The automated workflow is more accurate and decreased document errors by up to 90 percent.
    • The signature collecting process was cut from a minimum of 30 minutes to only 2 minutes.
    Incentivized
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    Adobe
    • A great ROI for time in my small architectural practice, [especially] when a design has been updated and a report needs to be submitted. We can be submitting many reports that all look similar, clean and beautiful. We just save as the file and replace the images with more updated images. This way the client finds it easy to navigate updated reports, as many as they can be.
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    ScreenShots

    Adobe Acrobat Screenshots

    Screenshot of where to create, edit, convert, and share PDF files all from within Microsoft Teams – as part of Acrobat integrations with Microsoft 365 apps.Screenshot of Liquid Mode in Adobe Acrobat Reader mobile app, where users can read PDFs on phones and tablets without having to pinch and zoom. Navigate lengthy documents with intelligent outline and search tools, while maximizing readability and comfort with font size and line spacing that are adjustable.Screenshot of where to fill and sign PDF forms from anywhere and on any device. Here, users can collect signatures, digitally track progress, and automatically archive the signed document.Screenshot of the Adobe Scan mobile app, used to capture and convert documents into high-quality, interactive PDF documents that can be filled out, signed, and shared. This eliminates the hassle of finding a printer, filling a form by hand, and scanning it again.