How to Annotate a PDF on Mac to Boost Your Reading Experience

Many students may wonder how to write an annotation for an article in PDF format, or teachers may need a straightforward way to comment on a scholarly article.

This post will outline three efficient methods for Mac users to annotate a PDF, allowing you to highlight text in PDF, add shapes and comments within a PDF, and more, to enhance the readability of a research paper.

How to Annotate a PDF Using Preview

Preview, the default PDF viewer on macOS devices, allows users to natively add annotations to PDFs without the need for third-party software.

While it provides basic PDF annotation tools, Preview lacks more advanced features such as editing existing text and OCR capabilities.

Step 1. Open a PDF with Preview

Double-click a PDF file to open with Preview, providing that Preview is the default PDF viewer on your Mac. If not, right-click on the PDF file, and Open With with Preview.

Step 2. Make Annotations on a PDF with Preview

Click on the Pencil icon to access the Highlight and Notes tools. Or, click the Show Markup Toolbar on the topmost window for more options such as adding text and shape to the PDF, digitally signing a PDF, etc.

Once the annotations are completed, go to the File menu, and select Save to store the document’s changes.

How to Annotate PDF Files on Mac via Adobe Acrobat Reader

Adobe Acrobat Reader is a free application that allows users to view, annotate, sign, and print PDF files. It is compatible with various operating systems, including Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android.

If you have installed the software, you can use its versatile tools to annotate PDF files. Run the app and select the Comment tool to start. Apart from the basic annotation tools, Adobe Acrobat Reader allows you to draw on a PDF with various special shapes.

However, for more advanced features like OCR and AI capabilities, you may need to upgrade to the paid Adobe Acrobat Pro subscription, which costs around $250/yr.

How to Annotate an Article in PDF Format with Free PDF Annotator

When fully annotating a PDF on a Mac, you can bypass the built-in Preview app or the paid Adobe Acrobat Pro, but you won’t want to overlook PDFgear, one of the best free PDF annotators that features OCR and an AI assistant to rapidly scan and summarize PDF content.

Additionally, this app provides versatile reading modes, including Day Mode, Dark Mode, and Eye Protection Mode, to significantly enhance the overall reading experience.

Step 1. Install the Free PDF Annotator on macOS Device

Download PDFgear for macOS on your device, and launch the application. Click Open File to browse and select a PDF to open. Alternatively, you can drag and drop a PDF to import.

Step 2. Write Annotations for the PDF

With PDFgear’s intuitive interface, you can easily highlight images and lines in a PDF to emphasize, add shapes to a PDF, use the strikethrough, and put comments on the content that is hard to understand.

Furthermore, PDFgear also enables you to utilize its OCR PDF functionality to extract text from PDF documents containing handwritten content, facilitating the recognition of words that are challenging to distinguish.

Step 3. Save the Revised PDF Document

After creating all the needed annotations to your PDF file, locate the File menu, and select Save to store the updated file.

FAQs About How to Annotate a PDF

How to annotate a PDF on Windows?

PDFgear, compatible with Windows, Mac, and iOS devices, is the best tool to annotate PDFs on Windows. It is free to download and use, without email sign-up or watermarks for the exported files.

How do I annotate an article without any cost?

Whether you need to annotate a scientific paper or a journal article, PDFgear, with its full-featured annotation tools and advanced OCR feature, should be your go-to solution.

What is the best PDF annotation software for Mac?

We recommend PDFgear, as it provides both online and offline tools to help you comment on your PDFs.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Preview on macOS devices offers a straightforward method on how to annotate an article in PDF form. Adobe Acrobat Reader provides robust annotation tools to enhence the readibility of a file. Both of them have disadvantages.

Overall, PDFgear is the premier choice for annotating articles in PDF format on macOS devices. It is free without email sign-up, and you can access all adanced features without further pay.