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Stirling PDF
Stirling PDF ranks #7 of 27 in pdf editors in the week of 26 October 2026, with a visibility score of 16 across ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity. It was named in 35% of the answers we sampled.
sampled: 2 of 4 assistants this week
Stirling PDF lands in the PDF editors category with an overall score of 17 out of 100, named in 17 of 68 answers across AI assistants. Claude rates it highest at 36, while ChatGPT and Perplexity each give it 9. It shows up most reliably for open-source or self-hosted PDF tool questions, named in 3 of 3 answers, and does well for browser-based editors and privacy-focused document handling, each named in around half the relevant answers. It's never mentioned for redaction, PDF summarising or chat, form filling and signing, or converting to Word, Excel, or extracting tables.
this is mine claim it, free, forever. We also check whether ChatGPT and Claude can read stirlingpdf.com.
Who's talking about you
| assistant | score | named in, this week | usual spot, this week |
|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | 6 | 10% of answers | #2.0 |
| Claude | 31 | 60% of answers | #6.2 |
| Gemini | not sampled this week | ||
| Perplexity | not sampled this week |
Questions you win
| question | named in | best spot |
|---|---|---|
| Which PDF tool is best for privacy and sensitive documents? | 3 of 3 | #1 |
| What's the best open-source or self-hosted PDF tool? | 2 of 2 | #1 |
| What are the best alternatives to PDFgear? | 1 of 2 | #2 |
| What's the best OCR tool to make a scanned PDF searchable? | 1 of 2 | #3 |
| What's the best tool to merge, split and reorder PDF pages? | 1 of 2 | #4 |
| What's the best online PDF editor that works in the browser? | 1 of 2 | #5 |
| What's the best tool to edit a PDF without a subscription? | 1 of 2 | #6 |
| Which PDF editor is best value for a small business? | 1 of 2 | #8 |
| What are the best PDF editors in 2026? | 1 of 2 | #8 |
| What are the best alternatives to Adobe Acrobat? | 1 of 2 | #9 |
| What are the best alternatives to PDF-XChange Editor? | 1 of 2 | #10 |
| What are the best alternatives to Foxit? | 1 of 2 | #16 |
| What's the best alternative to Adobe Acrobat? | 1 of 3 | #8 |
| What are the best PDF editors? | 1 of 3 | #9 |
| What's the best PDF editor for Windows? | 1 of 3 | #9 |
| What's the best free PDF editor? | 1 of 4 | #9 |
Questions you lose
| question | who got named instead |
|---|---|
| What's the best PDF editor for Mac? | PDF Expert, Adobe Acrobat, Preview |
| What's the best PDF editor app for iPhone or Android? | Adobe Acrobat, Xodo, PDF Expert |
| What's the best tool to fill in and sign a PDF form? | Adobe Acrobat, Preview, PDF-XChange Editor |
| What's the best tool to convert a PDF to Word or Excel? | Adobe Acrobat, Microsoft Word, ABBYY FineReader |
| What's the best tool to compress a large PDF? | PDFgear, Adobe Acrobat, PDF24 |
| What's the best tool to redact or remove sensitive text from a PDF? | Adobe Acrobat, Foxit, PDF-XChange Editor |
| What's the best tool to extract tables or data from a PDF? | Adobe Acrobat, ABBYY FineReader |
| What's the best AI tool to summarise or chat with a PDF? | nobody in particular |
| What are the best alternatives to Preview? | PDF Expert, Adobe Acrobat, PDFgear |
Assistants cited 20 pages for questions in this category that name your rivals and not you. Claim to see them. See all sources for PDF editors.
In their words
- Claude“Stirling PDF — Self-hosted, open-source web toolkit.”
- ChatGPT“My top recommendation is Stirling-PDF\.”
- Gemini“The Best Overall for Complete Privacy: Stirling-PDF”
Closest rivals
- Stirling PDF vs PDF Expert15
- Stirling PDF vs PDF2415
- Stirling PDF vs Nitro PDF14
- Stirling PDF vs Sejda14
- Stirling PDF vs Smallpdf18
All Stirling PDF alternatives · Full PDF editors leaderboard · Sources