Google Docs has had 'open PDF in Docs' for years. Drive offers it on every PDF. It works — sort of. The catch is what 'works' means here. Layouts break, tables shift, multi-column documents flatten. For text content you can edit and republish as a Doc, fine. For PDFs that need to stay PDFs, it's the wrong tool.
What Google Docs does to PDFs
Drive → right-click PDF → Open with → Google Docs. Drive converts the PDF to Doc format. Text becomes editable; layout becomes approximate. Tables sometimes survive, sometimes don't. Images go in but reflow. Footnotes turn into text. The result is a Doc, not a PDF.
For harvesting text content, useful. For editing a PDF and keeping it a PDF, painful.
What Flint does
Flint edits the PDF as a PDF. Click text to edit; the layout doesn't move. Add new text boxes for blank fields. Save — it's still a PDF, opens in any reader with the original look preserved (now with your edits).
For PDFs that need to stay PDFs (contracts, official forms, branded documents), this is the difference.
When Docs is actually right
If you need the content as editable text to remix into a new document — extract paragraphs into a report, repurpose tables into a spreadsheet, etc. — Docs' conversion is useful. The destination isn't a PDF; it's a Doc. Use Docs when that's the intent.
The hybrid flow
Sometimes you want both — text extraction for analysis, plus PDF edits for the actual file. Use Docs for the extraction, Flint for the PDF edits. Each does one job well.
FAQ
Will Google Docs ever edit PDFs properly?
Google's roadmap doesn't suggest this is a priority. Docs is positioned as a word processor, not a PDF editor. The Doc-conversion approach is what they offer; true PDF editing is left to other tools.
Can I save a Google Doc back as PDF?
Yes — File → Download → PDF. The result is a new PDF based on the Doc, with whatever layout shifts happened during conversion. Compare with the original PDF — usually visibly different.
Is Flint Drive-integrated?
Not via OAuth currently. Download from Drive, edit in Flint, upload back. Manual but reliable.
Docs for text extraction, Flint for PDF edits. Two tools, two jobs.