Fill and sign a PDF form

Two kinds of PDF form

Forms arrive in two shapes, and the tool handles both.

Fillable forms were made with interactive fields: you can click into a box and type. Application forms from banks, government departments and insurers are usually like this. The tool reads the fields when you open the file and shows them as a list: text boxes to type into, checkboxes to tick, drop-downs to choose from. Your answers go into the form's own fields, in the font and position the form's author intended.

Flat forms are scans or exports with no fields at all, just lines and boxes printed on the page. There is nothing to click into, so you place answers yourself: tap where a name goes and type, tap a box and add a checkmark, add today's date beside the signature line. Each placed answer can be dragged and resized to sit neatly on the printed line.

Many real forms are a mix: fields for most answers, and a signature line with no field. That is why both modes are on one page.

Signing the form

When the answers are in, add your signature: drawn, typed or uploaded. It is stamped onto the page, then every form field is flattened. Flattening turns your answers into normal page content. The copy you send cannot be edited in a PDF reader without the change being obvious, and it looks the same on every device, which is not always true of live form fields.

Privacy

Forms tend to carry the most personal information people ever put in a PDF: identity numbers, addresses, bank details, health questions. Most online form fillers upload the file to process it. This one does not. The PDF engine runs in your browser, so your answers exist only on your device and in the file you download.

Common problems, and fixes

• The form says it is protected. Some PDFs are encrypted against editing. The tool cannot fill those; ask the sender for an unprotected copy, or print, fill by hand and scan.
• Text does not fit a box. Placed text shrinks to fit the box you drew; make the box wider rather than the text smaller.
• A checkbox shows an X rather than a tick. That is how the form's own checkbox is drawn by its author; it counts as ticked.

If the form has to be signed by someone else as well as you, send it through document signing software so each person signs their part and everyone gets the final copy.