Adobe Acrobat on Mac costs £15.17/month, or £180/year. For most people editing two PDFs a month, that's an absurd subscription. The Mac already comes with Preview, which is excellent. And for the bits Preview can't do, there's a free browser tool that does them.
Preview covers more than you think
Preview handles annotation, signing (trackpad or camera), drag-and-drop page merging, reordering, rotation, image export, basic compression — all built-in, all instant. The list of 'Acrobat features' most users actually use overlaps Preview's capabilities by about 70%.
Flint covers the rest
The remaining 30% — editing actual text, converting to Word with format preserved, smarter compression, true redaction, password protection, unlocking PDFs — all live in Flint for free. Browser-based, no install.
Between Preview and Flint, you cover essentially everything a typical Acrobat workflow does.
When Acrobat is still worth it
Specific cases that genuinely need Acrobat: heavy redaction workflows with audit, complex interactive forms with JavaScript calculations, accessibility tagging for compliance, certified digital signatures with timestamping. If those are your work, pay the £15. If they're not, save it.
What you give up
Without Acrobat, you lose Acrobat-only features: Send for Signature (replace with Flint sign + email), automated form filling (use Flint manually), PDF/A conversion for archival (less common). Most are workarounds rather than missing capabilities.
FAQ
Is there a free Acrobat alternative for Mac?
Preview plus Flint together cover most Acrobat use cases. For people who specifically want a single 'Acrobat replacement' desktop app, options like PDF Expert and Skim exist but cost money. The browser route is usually faster and free.
Can I edit PDF forms without Acrobat?
Preview can fill PDF forms (text fields, checkboxes). Flint can edit underlying text in forms. Complex forms with calculations or scripts need Acrobat. Simple forms work fine in either.
Will Flint work on older Macs?
Anything running macOS 12 or later with modern Safari works. Older Macs (Intel from 2015+) handle it fine. Browser processing is the bottleneck; the Mac's age matters less than browser version.
Cancel the Acrobat subscription. Use Flint plus Preview. Save £180 a year.