PDFtk

Active

Country: United States (US)
Founded: 2003
Developer: PDF Labs (Sid Steward)
Pricing: Free (PDFtk Free); Paid (PDFtk Pro)
Open source: No
Platforms: Windows, Linux, macOS

Indexes

PDF Tools

Overview

PDFtk is a PDF manipulation toolkit offering command-line (PDFtk Server) and graphical (PDFtk Free and Pro) interfaces for tasks such as merging, splitting, rotating, watermarking, encrypting, and repairing PDF documents. It targets developers, power users, and general users needing precise PDF processing, with command-line tools suited for automation and scripting in server environments.³⁴⁶

Key Features

Merge PDFs - Combines multiple PDF files into one using command-line or GUI.³⁴
Split PDFs - Extracts single pages or ranges from PDFs into separate files.²⁴
Encrypt/Decrypt - Applies or removes passwords and permissions on PDFs.⁴⁶
Rotate Pages - Rotates specific pages by 90, 180, or 270 degrees.⁴⁵
Update Metadata - Modifies PDF info like title, author, subject, and keywords.²⁶
Repair PDFs - Fixes corrupted XREF tables and stream lengths.⁴
Burst Pages - Splits a PDF into individual pages with optional data dump.⁴⁶
Watermark/Stamp - Adds watermarks or stamps to PDF pages in Pro version.³⁷

Pricing

Plan	Price	Includes
PDFtk Free	Free	GUI for merging/splitting, includes PDFtk Server CLI.
PDFtk Pro	Paid (commercial license)	Full GUI for split, merge, rotate, watermark, stamp, secure.
PDFtk Server	Free with PDFtk Free; Paid standalone	Command-line tool for server-side PDF processing.

Platforms & Requirements

PDFtk Server runs on Windows, Linux, and macOS via command-line with no specific minimum requirements noted beyond standard OS support. PDFtk Free and Pro are graphical tools primarily for Windows, with server tools cross-platform. Limitations include command-line syntax complexity for complex tasks.²³⁶

Integrations & Ecosystem

Ghostscript for PDF compression
Drupal module for PDF merging
stdin/stdout piping for scripting
Text editors for uncompressed PDF editing
Server-side automation in PC software
Metadata import/export via text files

Alternatives

App	Difference
Ghostscript	More focused on rendering and conversion, less on simple merging/splitting.
qpdf	Open-source CLI alternative with similar manipulation but different syntax.
PDFsam	Free GUI tool emphasizing visual splitting/merging without CLI.
pdftk-java	Open-source Java port avoiding proprietary licensing issues.

Reputation

PDFtk is regarded as a reliable, fast command-line tool for PDF manipulation, praised for efficiency in merging, splitting, and repairing documents across Linux and Windows environments.²¹ Users note its powerful functionality in a small 4MB package but criticize the complex syntax for advanced operations.² The proprietary nature contrasts with open-source alternatives, yet it remains widely used for server automation.³⁶

Sources (10)