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Stirling PDF vs iLovePDF Desktop: catalog facts
Stirling PDFiLovePDF Desktop
Freemium

Free plan is $0/month with no card required (60+ tools, web/desktop/self-hosted, 500…

Freemium

A limited free tier is available. Premium is a paid subscription.

Windows, macOS, Linux, Web, Self-hosted Windows, macOS
  • 55+ PDF tools covering signing, converting, merging, editing, OCR and redaction, chained in a stateful workspace with…
  • Runs on Docker, bare metal, Kubernetes or as native desktop apps for Windows, macOS and Linux
  • Processing happens locally rather than uploading files to a server
  • Batch processing across many documents at once
  • Open-core: SSO, external database, Google Drive integration, SAML and audit logs are gated behind paid Team or…
  • Manual server setup needs Java 25+ plus LibreOffice and Tesseract for conversions and OCR
  • Most tools are restricted without a premium subscription
  • Windows and macOS only, closed source
Self-hosted, Downloadable app, Web application, Hosted service Downloadable app
Open source Closed source
License: MIT License not stated
No account needed Not stated if an account is needed
Works offline Not stated if it works offline

Checked September 20, 2026

Checked September 22, 2026

Catalog facts only. Anything “not stated” is unconfirmed. Check full listings for details.