User profile for user: rameshrawat
rameshrawat Author
User level: Level 1
4 points

👉 What is the best free or affordable PDF software for MacBook with bookmarking and OCR features?

Hi everyone,


I’m looking for a reliable PDF software for my MacBook that allows me to add bookmarks and also has a good OCR (Optical Character Recognition) function to make scanned PDFs searchable.

I don’t need anything too advanced — just something that’s efficient, user-friendly, and ideally free or reasonably priced.


Could you please suggest some good options (freeware or one-time purchase preferred) that work well on macOS?


Any personal recommendations or comparisons with tools like PDF Expert, Adobe Acrobat, or Foxit would be really helpful.

Thanks in advance! 🙏

MacBook Air 13″, macOS 26.0

Posted on Oct 4, 2025 3:23 AM

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User profile for user: VikingOSX
VikingOSX
User level: Level 10
123,254 points

Posted on Oct 4, 2025 6:45 AM

Beginning with macOS Sonoma (14.*), Apple added OCR capability to the Export panel in Preview. Open a scanned PDF in Preview and then select File menu > Export… Choose Format: PDF and on its list of options, there will be Embed Text. That is Apple's obscure way of offering OCR. Here is an example from German text, where I have changed the suffix of the exported PDF to " _with_ocr."



If you want to add bookmarks that link you to other locations in a PDF, then Apple's Preview is not the tool for that and you will still need a proper PDF Editor such as the free trial of Code Industry's Master PDF Editor. It is non-subscription and probably closer to your idea of "affordable." It also can do OCR, but that probably is not enabled in the trial version.

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User profile for user: VikingOSX
VikingOSX
User level: Level 10
123,254 points

Oct 4, 2025 6:45 AM in response to rameshrawat

Beginning with macOS Sonoma (14.*), Apple added OCR capability to the Export panel in Preview. Open a scanned PDF in Preview and then select File menu > Export… Choose Format: PDF and on its list of options, there will be Embed Text. That is Apple's obscure way of offering OCR. Here is an example from German text, where I have changed the suffix of the exported PDF to " _with_ocr."



If you want to add bookmarks that link you to other locations in a PDF, then Apple's Preview is not the tool for that and you will still need a proper PDF Editor such as the free trial of Code Industry's Master PDF Editor. It is non-subscription and probably closer to your idea of "affordable." It also can do OCR, but that probably is not enabled in the trial version.

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👉 What is the best free or affordable PDF software for MacBook with bookmarking and OCR features?

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