Redacting.ai vs Adobe Acrobat redaction
Adobe Acrobat Pro includes a redaction tool. Redacting.ai does one job: it suggests redactions in a PDF you upload, you review them, and it exports a redacted copy. The Adobe facts below come from Adobe's own pages, listed under Sources with the date they were checked.
| Feature | Redacting.ai | Adobe Acrobat Pro |
|---|---|---|
| How redactions are found | ||
| How redactions are found | Suggests redactions automatically after upload. Review every suggested redaction before you apply it. | You search for words, phrases or patterns. |
| Your own search terms or patterns | ||
| Your own search terms or patterns | Not available. You can draw redaction boxes on the page by hand instead. | Yes, with Find Text & Redact. |
| Permanent removal | ||
| Permanent removal | Selected text is permanently removed from the output, not covered by a movable box. | Permanently removes the selected text and graphics. |
| Hidden content | ||
| Hidden content | Strips metadata and other hidden content from the exported file. | Remove Hidden Information removes hidden text, metadata, comments and attachments. A Sanitize option is also offered. |
| Where it runs | ||
| Where it runs | In a web browser. No desktop or mobile app. | Not compared. We could not confirm from Adobe's pages which Acrobat apps include the redaction tool. |
| Price | ||
| Price | Starter, Pro and Super cost $19, $49 or $149 per month for 500, 3,000 or 15,000 pages. The first bounded PDF is free after email verification. A card-backed 7-day Pro trial is offered during checkout. | Acrobat Pro costs US$19.99/mo on an annual plan billed monthly, US$29.99/mo on a monthly plan, or US$239.88/yr prepaid. A 7-day free trial converts automatically to a paid plan. |
What Redacting.ai does not do
- Accepts PDF only. Office files and standalone images are not accepted.
- Password-protected PDFs are not accepted.
- No search for your own words or patterns.
- No desktop or mobile app.
- Every exported page carries a small "REDACTED - Processed by RedactingAI" line at the foot of the page.
Scanned PDFs
Image-only PDFs are OCRed automatically before review. OCR may take longer, and an unclear scan can stop with a clear error. This page does not compare scanned-PDF handling because we could not check Adobe's current documentation for it.
Try it on your own PDF
The first completed document is free. No card is required. Already redacted a file somewhere else? The free redaction checker shows whether text is still hidden behind the black boxes. For how uploaded files are handled, read the privacy policy.
Sources
Adobe facts on this page come only from these pages. Prices are in US dollars for an individual plan.
- Adobe Acrobat Pro product pageAcrobat Pro prices and redaction listed as a Pro feature. Checked 2026-09-29.
- Adobe Acrobat pricing pageRedaction listed under Acrobat Pro. Checked 2026-09-29.
- Adobe Acrobat free trial pageLength of the free trial and its conversion to a paid plan. Checked 2026-09-29.
- Adobe guide: how to redact a PDFSearch and pattern redaction, permanent removal, Remove Hidden Information and Sanitize. Checked 2026-09-29.