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AskYourPDF vs PDF.ai

Two fact sheets from our own research, side by side — pricing, platforms, API access and status re-checked by us rather than quoted from the vendors.

The short answer

Cheaper paid plan
PDF.ai — $10/mo vs $11.99/mo for AskYourPDF
Free plan
Both have one
Public API
Both have one
Higher Trust score
AskYourPDF — 89 vs 68 for PDF.ai
Best fit
AskYourPDF: Researchers querying large PDF sets and citing back to specific pages · PDF.ai: Students and researchers querying long papers and reports

From our own records as of each tool's last check. Anything we have not confirmed is left out rather than guessed. How we verify

AskYourPDFChat with PDFs plus embeddable document-trained chatbotsPDF.aiChat with PDFs for answers and summaries, plus an API that parses, extracts fields from and splits documents.

Side by side

FactAskYourPDFPDF.ai
CategoryPDF ToolsChat with Documents & PDF
Pricing modelFreemiumFreemium
Starts at$11.99/mo$10/mo
Public APIYesYes
Trust score89 / 10068 / 100
PlatformsWeb, iOS, Android, Chrome extension, APIWeb, Chrome extension, API
CompanyProtonlabs Technology Inc.—
Launched2023—
Last verifiedOct 25, 2026Oct 29, 2026

What our research says

AskYourPDF

A sensible pick when the job is repeatable question-answering across a document library rather than one clever answer, and the embeddable agent plus API are what separate it from the many ChatPDF clones. If you already live in Google's stack, NotebookLM covers the research half at no cost.

Pros

  • Page-level source citations instead of unattributed summaries
  • Documented API and Chrome extension, so it fits into existing workflows
  • Very large per-document page ceilings (2,500 on Premium, 6,000 on Pro)
  • Premium at $11.99/month billed yearly undercuts most document-chat rivals

Cons

  • Free tier is one document, three conversations and 50 questions per day
  • Advertised prices are annual-billing rates; monthly billing costs about 25% more
  • Daily rather than monthly quotas mean a heavy research day hits a hard wall
  • The 40-plus free writing tools are search-traffic surface, not the product

PDF.ai

PDF.ai works well for someone who reads long PDFs and wants quick answers and summaries, and for developers who need a simple REST call to turn PDFs into structured data. Users who only occasionally ask about a short file can stay on the free tier or use a general chatbot; enterprises with strict data-residency needs will find little public information about who runs the service.

Pros

  • Chat with one file or across a whole library of uploads
  • Separate parsing, extraction and splitting API with a free monthly allowance
  • Chrome extension, screenshot-and-ask and embeddable PDF chatbot
  • Annual billing cuts the Pro price from $17 to $10 a month

Cons

  • Free plan is limited to very small files and page counts
  • Team, capture and embed features sit on per-user plans
  • The site names no company, address or team

Which one fits

Choose AskYourPDF if you need

  • Researchers querying large PDF sets and citing back to specific pages
  • Support teams embedding a chatbot trained on manuals and policy documents
  • Repeatedly filling the same non-fillable PDF forms from source records

Choose PDF.ai if you need

  • Students and researchers querying long papers and reports
  • Office teams summarizing contracts, manuals and filings
  • Developers who need parse, extract and split endpoints without building OCR

AskYourPDF vs PDF.ai: the questions people ask

Is AskYourPDF cheaper than PDF.ai?

On published entry prices, PDF.ai starts lower — $10/mo against $11.99/mo for AskYourPDF. Entry price is the lowest paid plan as we last verified it; what each plan includes differs.

Does AskYourPDF or PDF.ai have a free tier?

Both: AskYourPDF has a free tier, and PDF.ai has a free tier.

Which has a public API, AskYourPDF or PDF.ai?

Both ship a public API, so either can be built on; the fact table above shows the platforms each one runs on.

More comparisons

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