Smallpdf vs Stirling PDF
as AI assistants see them, week of 2026-09-21
Smallpdf edges out Stirling PDF overall, scoring 18 versus 17 and appearing in 21 of 68 answers compared to Stirling PDF's 17. Smallpdf is named in every answer (4 of 4) for compressing large PDFs, while Stirling PDF sweeps the open-source or self-hosted PDF tool question, named in 3 of 3 answers. Head to head, Smallpdf comes out ahead more often, named more in 9 questions versus 6 for Stirling PDF, with 5 ties. By assistant, Claude rates Stirling PDF highest at 36, while Perplexity favors Smallpdf at 27. Neither tool is named for redacting sensitive text or summarizing PDFs with AI.
Head to head
| metric | Smallpdf | Stirling PDF |
|---|---|---|
| score | 18 | 17 |
| questions won | 12 | 12 |
By assistant
Smallpdf
| assistant | score | named in, this week | usual spot, this week |
|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | 8 | 10% of answers | #2.5 |
| Claude | 21 | 45% of answers | #8.6 |
| Gemini | not sampled this week | ||
| Perplexity | 27 | 40% of answers | #4.1 |
Stirling PDF
| assistant | score | named in, this week | usual spot, this week |
|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | 9 | 10% of answers | #2.0 |
| Claude | 36 | 60% of answers | #5.4 |
| Gemini | not sampled this week | ||
| Perplexity | 9 | 10% of answers | #1.5 |
Where they differ
Only Smallpdf gets named for
- What's the best tool to compress a large PDF?
- What's the best tool to fill in and sign a PDF form?
- What's the best tool to convert a PDF to Word or Excel?
- What's the best tool to redact or remove sensitive text from a PDF?
- Which PDF editor is best value for a small business?
- What's the best PDF editor app for iPhone or Android?
Only Stirling PDF gets named for
- What's the best open-source or self-hosted PDF tool?
- Which PDF tool is best for privacy and sensitive documents?
- What's the best tool to edit a PDF without a subscription?
- What's the best PDF editor for Windows?
- What's the best OCR tool to make a scanned PDF searchable?
- What's the best PDF editor for Mac?
More comparisons
- Preview vs Smallpdf
- Sejda vs Smallpdf
- PDF-XChange Editor vs Smallpdf
- PDF Expert vs Smallpdf
- Preview vs Stirling PDF
- Sejda vs Stirling PDF
Not sold on either?
Scores count how often each assistant names a product, weighted by position. How the score works · Full PDF editors leaderboard