# Apache PDFBox Reviews **Vendor:** The Apache Software Foundation **Category:** [Document Generation Software](https://www.g2.com/categories/document-generation) **Average Rating:** 4.3/5.0 **Total Reviews:** 12 ## About Apache PDFBox Apache PDFBox library is an open source Java tool for working with PDF documents. ## Apache PDFBox Reviews ### 1. Innovative library for the general use of PDF **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Jacob H. | Computer Programmer, Computer Software, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 30, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** The truth is that it is a very useful tool but it is being named relatively now, it is very useful since it is open source therefore anyone can use it and besides that it allows us to operate with PDF files, that is to say , allows us to create, process, print, divide, combine, extract texts, among many other functions, it is worth mentioning that it is a JAVA library and to be used with this programming language, its integration is super simple and fast in the language. **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** The only negative thing is that it does not have much support or a large community to support it, in addition to technical support is not very good at the time of consulting doubts but outside of that I think a very good option to turn to as a programmer when we want to use functions with PDF. **Recommendations to others considering Apache PDFBox:** I recommend it widely and more because it is open source and its use can be by anyone who wants it, besides that it is a library that in my opinion is super complete and that making the call to their respective elements is not complicated. It is much better than other options that I have used and certainly much better than trying to perform the functions from scratch. **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** The truth is that I have used this library on very specific occasions but I can say that I have not left any complaint, the library is very good and practices for the amount of functions that simplifies you. ### 2. Ultimate solution to convert dynamically created documents to pdf **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Saurabh C. | Java Developer, Information Technology and Services, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 28, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** Works well with JAVA and JVM supported languages. Easy Integration, Dependencies easily managed via maven. Ability to create new pdf well as editing and merging multiple pdf makes it really great. Most easy way to manipulate PDF documents in Java **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** Some functionalities are lost or changed during migration to the new version. Pdfbox-1.8 to Pdfbox-2.0.2 such as with code for creating pdf from native doc and word doc, some random characters were getting inserted, so had to revert the upgrade and apply manual fix before upgrade, Not Backward compactible. Upgrade of of Java 8 to my application using Pdfbox 2.0.2 cause much slowness in document creation process. **Recommendations to others considering Apache PDFBox:** The only problem I faced was during the upgrade, there was loss or change of functionality that caused my application to misbehave, So the suggestion is to keep current functionality as it to work with code written for legacy version. **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** For me, I was able to convert various word documents to pdf and merge them to single document without loosing any formatting data. Also using pdfbox this process became very fast and easy to integrate in my java code. ### 3. Make a PDF document with zero licensing cost **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Media Production | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 12, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** Apache PDFBox is free, is less resouce intensive, fast, can be easily integrated to the JAVA code, has lots of examples and is still growing to support newer features. And one thing special you can edit a pdf say remove 10 pages from an existing document by simply writing 2 lines of code. **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** Not all features are supported. Compared to the paid licensed iText is the best in this category but the cost involved may not be feasible for all small companies who have IT as a supporting area in their business. Also since not everyday we require all advanced feature so PDFbox is pretty good. Its is a little memory intensive where iText stands optimized. So depending upon the business leverage low cost and best solution PDFbox would be my choice. **Recommendations to others considering Apache PDFBox:** Easy to use, lots of handy examples, free of cost, can be commercially used as well. Easy to integrate in the JAVA projects , maven / gradel etc dependency, continuous improvements are present, styling tables, different borders, report format, colors can be easily added. **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** Creating PDF documents, reports on the fly , comerical reports to be sent to clients, various UI designs like table etc, editing of PDF by removing unwanted pages or adding / inserting PDF pages as and when required. No licensing headache, several examples and support community on the internet. The major benefit was lowering the cost in reports generation on the fly, easy to use and team found it very comfortable to switch with lots of handy examples. ### 4. If other command line tools like pdftk or exiftools arent' enough, take a look at this **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Rogher N. | Linux Driver Validation Lead, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 13, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** If Java is something you are used to give it a try. It's fairly robust and easy to incorporate into website or stand-alone apps. **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** Nothing really, just make sure to have something like intelliJ or something. Good IDE to navigate the library. **Recommendations to others considering Apache PDFBox:** Just try it out with Hello World app, something simple to get your feet wet. **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** Anything that we need to convert data into most accessible format out there. It's free. Who wouldn't try this. ### 5. Apache PDFBox is a Great Server Based PDF Manipulation Framework **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Josen R. | Business Owner, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 31, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** This project is open source and community driven. People have come together to create a truly functional set of utilities to perform common PDF tasks. **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** There isn't really anything that I didn't like. As with any tool, it takes time to learn the syntax and practicing write code. **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** I needed to manipulate PDF files on the server and this interface allowed me to do that. ### 6. Apache PDFBox - Working with PDF made Easy **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Information Technology and Services | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 06, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** Apache PDFBox 2 is a generally simple approach to control PDF reports in Java. Its liberal Apache 2 permit makes it agreeable to an exceptionally expansive gathering of people and its open source nature enables engineers to perceive how to utilize the libraries it utilizes underneath the spreads and adjust it as required. **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** Nothing as such the product is really good since it is an open source product. **Recommendations to others considering Apache PDFBox:** You should make use of the documentation. It is very well documented. **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** Generating pdf documents at Server side for a Java-based web application. ### 7. Easy PDF **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Gabriel D. | Brick Specialist, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 12, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** So easy to use especially with JAVA files. Makes editing super easy. Runs extremely smooth as well. **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** Doesn’t have much support to it. When you run into an technical issues it can be a bit time consuming to get support. **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** Creating PDF files and no licensing issues to deal with! ### 8. Love this product!!! **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Kelley W. | Guest Services, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 11, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** It is very affordable. It is less likely to break the bank. **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** It isn't compatible with all other programs. It is easy to download and it doesn't take up as much space as a competing software. **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** It is more affordable than a competing software. It doesn't have much malware. ### 9. Great way to work with PDFs **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Anna Beth H. | Teacher, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 12, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** I like that I can manipulate existing PDF files whereas before, I could only read them. **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** I do not dislike anything about this product. **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** Apache PDFBox makes it easy to open, read, and edit PDF files. It allows me to do all of these things in one platform. ### 10. a versatile tool to work with pdf **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Mechanical or Industrial Engineering | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 12, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** is flexible to extract and create pdf, It is also the rendering of the images, and the visualization **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** I would say that I do not have the minimum requirements, which are: Java6 or higher. pdfbox fontbox levigo-jbig2-imageio commons-loggin **Recommendations to others considering Apache PDFBox:** If you want to obtain better visualization of images and have a performance resource use it without a doubt for your work, you must have the minimum for your installation **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** a quality option to work with pdf files ### 11. It's one of the best and well documented API for manipulating PDF documents using java language!! **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** piyush s. | Software Engineer, Information Technology and Services, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** May 13, 2018 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** the best thing is that it's an opensource API in java , we just have to download the JAR file and import JPDFBox class to access PDF document from your java program,and it contains all kind of methods that you can think of while working with PDF documents,we can extract text , create PDF , split PDF ,insert image , watch preview of PDF using java language !! **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** they release new versions very rarely , sometimes it throws exception although your code is correct!! **Recommendations to others considering Apache PDFBox:** If you want to access any PDF document using java then you should use this API for sure , it's rally easy to understand and implement , you can also find different video tutorials for this API!! **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** We created PDF online printing software for different collages in Gujarat in which we used this API for getting some information like page no,Author ID of user and also for generating their bills in PDF!! ### 12. Must have to PDF manipulation in Java **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Information Technology and Services | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 11, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache PDFBox?** Ease of use and API clarity. It is very easy to extract text from PDF to feed it through indexing for example. **What do you dislike about Apache PDFBox?** Documentation is very clear but it is not always easy to find samples. **What problems is Apache PDFBox solving and how is that benefiting you?** I extract data from invoice to do automatic classification of costs. ## Apache PDFBox Discussions - [The final combined PDF is non-linearized](https://www.g2.com/discussions/26446-the-final-combined-pdf-is-non-linearized) - 1 upvote - [View Apache PDFBox pricing details and edition comparison](https://www.g2.com/products/apache-pdfbox/reviews?section=pricing&secure%5Bexpires_at%5D=2026-05-31+22%3A39%3A00+-0500&secure%5Bsession_id%5D=57e15917-94ac-4820-ba35-16bfa6d651b2&secure%5Btoken%5D=12000cc0cd2b881ae4e543a301c69c2402a74c786dcda218c6be15f1d3da08cd&format=llm_user) ## Apache PDFBox Features **Data Sources** - Software - Spreadsheets - Documents **Generation** - Templates - Automation - Branding **Delivery** - Workflow - Schedule - Batch **Generative AI** - AI Text Generation - AI Text Summarization - AI Text-to-Image - AI Image-to-Text **Agentic AI - Document Generation** - Autonomous Task Execution ## Top Apache PDFBox Alternatives - [Adobe Acrobat](https://www.g2.com/products/adobe-acrobat/reviews) - 4.5/5.0 (4,543 reviews) - [Wondershare PDFelement](https://www.g2.com/products/wondershare-wondershare-pdfelement/reviews) - 4.5/5.0 (1,028 reviews) - [Docusign CLM](https://www.g2.com/products/docusign-clm/reviews) - 4.3/5.0 (483 reviews)