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PDF.ai vs PDFtoChat

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

Free plan
Both — PDF.ai has a free plan, PDFtoChat is free to use
Public API
PDF.ai has one; not confirmed by us for PDFtoChat
Best fit
PDF.ai: Students and researchers querying long papers and reports · PDFtoChat: Occasional PDF Q&A without paying for a subscription
Platforms
PDF.ai: Web, Chrome extension · PDFtoChat: Web
Trust score
About even — PDF.ai 68, PDFtoChat 69

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

PDF.aiChat with PDFs for answers and summaries, plus an API that parses, extracts fields from and splits documents.PDFtoChatOpen-source web app for asking questions about an uploaded PDF, built on Together AI and vector search.

Side by side

FactPDF.aiPDFtoChat
CategoryChat with Documents & PDFChat with Documents & PDF
Pricing modelFreemiumFree
Starts at$10/mo—
Public APIYesNot confirmed
Trust score68 / 10069 / 100
PlatformsWeb, Chrome extension, APIWeb
Last verifiedOct 29, 2026Oct 15, 2026

What our research says

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

PDFtoChat

PDFtoChat does the single job of PDF question-answering competently and costs nothing, which makes it a reasonable pick for occasional use. It's a side project rather than a maintained product, so don't expect customer support, uptime guarantees, or new features on any schedule.

Pros

  • Free with no account limits mentioned
  • Open-source, so the retrieval pipeline is inspectable
  • Backed by real infrastructure sponsors (Together AI, Chroma) rather than an ad-hoc demo
  • Handles textbook and contract-length PDFs, not just short files

Cons

  • No company or support channel behind it, just an individual maintainer
  • As a side project, features and uptime aren't guaranteed long-term

Which one fits

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

Choose PDFtoChat if you need

  • Occasional PDF Q&A without paying for a subscription
  • Developers curious about the underlying RAG stack, since the code is public

PDF.ai vs PDFtoChat: the questions people ask

Is PDF.ai cheaper than PDFtoChat?

PDFtoChat is free to use; PDF.ai starts at $10/mo.

Does PDF.ai or PDFtoChat have a free tier?

Both: PDF.ai has a free tier, and PDFtoChat is free to use.

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

PDF.ai ships a public API, as of our last verification. A public API for PDFtoChat is not confirmed by us — check its developer docs before you plan an integration.

More comparisons

All PDFtoChat alternatives →Browse all Chat with Documents & PDF →