PDF Reader – PDFelement 4+

I needed a pdf editing app for removing unwanted pages from a pdf. Particularly from downloaded user manuals where the document is a large file because it includes instructions in many different languages. You can download the pdf, edit it and save the edited file.

This app does the business perfectly. I will be reading through the user manual to see what else it can do but for now it I gave it five stars as it’s great for me.

I had a shock when I first opened the app and it insisted on displaying in portrait when I habitually use my iPad in landscape - *all* developers please take note we're not all using phones! This was short-lived though, because once I got through the introductory screens it flipped to landscape OK.

All I wanted to do was select the relevant pages out of a PDF already downloaded and available in Files. The first job was to find it... and that involved opening Files, opening the PDF, and then sending it to the PDF Reader app.

Then I needed to figure out how to remove the unwanted pages (the user interface isn't what I would call intuitive). The poor thing there is that pages have to be selected and removed one at a time - never heard of tick boxes for multiple selection? Laborious, but OK it worked.

Then I needed to get the resulting edited PDF out of the app again. I tried exporting to Messenger, but that failed possibly because I left the app uploading in the background while I did other things (it seems to break the upload if taken out of focus). The problem was solved by linking to my Dropbox app, exporting to Dropbox (quick), and then letting Dropbox itself do the file sync in the background.

All in all this is hardly a Rolls-Royce of apps, but I achieved what I needed while away from the desk, where I have apps for this kind of thing on my PC.

My pdf edited documents reset at least teice while I was working on them. When I finally thought I had finished, I used the send to email option and was feeling assured all is well. The email never got sent out though. Almost made me miss a house tenancy application - meaning almost made me lose my future house! Luckily, I called the agency to verify. Tried sending to myself and definitely doesn’t work - but there is not message to inform you of failure of deliver, etc.

When it comes to using the app, the icons don’t have names to tell you what they do - there is at leadt one that eludes me. Majority are intuitive though. However, for text insert, I was not able to find a way to change the default mode, and had to manually change to preferred text colour and size every time.

Worst app I have ever had in terms of pdf editing.