Three Kinds of Free
"Free" means three different things in electronic signatures, and the tool that suits you depends on which one you need.
- Sign your own document. Apple Preview, Adobe's online tool and DocuSign's free account let you add your signature to a PDF. Nothing is sent for anyone else to sign.
- Send a few for others to sign. PandaDoc, Dropbox Sign, Zoho Sign and eSign.com give a small number of sends a month at no cost.
- Unlimited, for one person. SignFree has no monthly cap for a one-person business, and shows its own badge.
Every plan here was read on the vendor's own pages on 23 October 2026 and checked again on 2 November.
Options
| Tool | Free gives you | Cost, one person |
|---|---|---|
| Apple Preview | Sign your own PDFs | Free, built in |
| DocuSign | Sign yours, not send | $120 a year to send |
| Adobe Acrobat | Sign PDFs in browser | Free, sign in to save |
| PandaDoc | Five sends a month | Free, then $228 |
| Dropbox Sign | Three sends a month | Free, then $180 |
| Zoho Sign | Five envelopes a month | Free, paid plans vary |
| SignFree | Unlimited, one user | Free, then $119.88 |
| eSign.com | Five sends a month | Free, then $179.88 |
| Loop | Branded link, typed signature | $49 once |
These are US dollars for one person, before tax, on the cheapest paid plan that sends for others, billed yearly unless noted. Zoho Sign's page showed pounds to us, so we leave its dollar price out.
Apple Preview
Preview adds your own signature to a PDF on a Mac: open the PDF, use the Markup toolbar, and choose Sign. It signs your copy only. There is nothing to send for someone else to sign, and no record of who signed when. Wrong for: anyone who needs another person to sign. See Apple's guide to signing PDFs in Preview.
DocuSign
DocuSign says a free signer account lasts forever and is always free to sign and store documents. Sending documents for other people to sign starts with a free trial. DocuSign Personal is $10 a month billed annually, $120 a year, for 5 envelopes a month. We could not confirm the trial's length. Wrong for: anyone who needs to send for free. See DocuSign's free signature page, its free account page and its pricing.
Adobe Acrobat
Adobe says its online tools for signing PDFs are free, with no trial and no expiry, and that you can type, draw or upload a signature. Adobe's page says the file is deleted unless you sign in to save it. Its page is not clear on whether requesting signatures from others is free, so we make no claim. Wrong for: anyone who needs to know what is free for sending. See Adobe's sign PDF page.
PandaDoc
PandaDoc's free eSign plan allows sending up to 5 documents a month, and its page also says up to 60 a year, with up to two recipients per document and up to five templates. Starter is $19 a seat a month billed annually, which is $228 a year. The plan with your own branding is Business, $49 a seat a month billed annually, with a demo first. Wrong for: anyone who sends more than five a month. See PandaDoc's free eSign page and its pricing.
Dropbox Sign
Dropbox says all Dropbox customers can send up to three free signature requests a month, and signers need no Dropbox Sign account. Essentials, its cheapest paid plan, is $15 a month billed yearly ($180 a year) or $20 a month billed monthly, from an archived copy of its US pricing page of 20 October. Wrong for: anyone who sends more than three a month. See Dropbox's guide to signature requests, its page on signers and its pricing.
Zoho Sign
Zoho Sign has a free plan for a single user with 5 envelopes a month, and says signers do not need an account. After a 14-day trial of its paid features you move to the free plan automatically. Wrong for: anyone working in a team. See Zoho Sign's pricing.
SignFree
SignFree says it offers unlimited signatures, templates and audit trails for one-person businesses, with a "Powered by SignFree" badge on the free plan. Its Pro plan is $9.99 a month billed annually, $119.88 a year, and starts when someone else needs to log in. It says it provides simple electronic signatures only. Wrong for: anyone who needs a team or their own logo. See SignFree.
eSign.com
eSign.com's free Basic plan lists unlimited self-signing and 5 sign requests, and says anyone can send without an account. Premium is $14.99 a month per user billed annually, $179.88 a year. Wrong for: anyone who sends more than five. See eSign.com and its pricing.
Loop
Loop is a Mac app that turns a PDF or a picture into your own branded link, and it is not free. It has a 14-day trial, then costs $49 once for one person. It does one narrow job here: your client signs by typing their full name, with no account, and you see who opened the document and how far they read.
- You place the Sign Here spots, up to 12, and up to 10 named signers sign in order.
- A record. The signed copy has every page with the signature, then a last page recording who, when and which copy.
- A simple electronic signature. Loop's own record says the email was typed by the signer and was not checked.
Loop has no initials, drawn or uploaded signatures or tick boxes, and the signer only types a name. Text and date blanks are filled in by you, the sender, and you can save your own documents as templates, though there is no library of ready-made ones. It has no payments or client portal, and the sender needs a Mac. Wrong for: anyone who needs it free after 14 days, who is on Windows, or whose contract needs a checked identity.
Your own branded link, with notes on the exact second. $49 once.
Limits
- Sign your own, nothing else. Preview, DocuSign's free account and Adobe's tool sign your copy.
- Send a few, with a cap. Dropbox Sign allows 3 a month, PandaDoc, Zoho Sign and eSign.com 5 a month.
- Unlimited, but solo and with a badge. SignFree.
- Your own logo costs money. On the plan tables we read, branding is on paid plans: PandaDoc Business, Zoho Sign's higher plans, SignNow's $30-a-month plan and SignFree Pro.
- No watermark is stated on any free plan page we read.
The Law
In the United States, federal law says that for a transaction in or affecting interstate or foreign commerce, a signature or contract cannot be denied legal effect, validity or enforceability solely because it is in electronic form. That is 15 U.S.C. 7001(a), the ESIGN Act. The Act defines an electronic signature as an electronic sound, symbol or process attached to or logically associated with a record and adopted by a person with the intent to sign it. In our reading, a typed name adopted with that intent fits the definition.
The Act says nothing about free versus paid, and it does not promise that a tool's record will win an argument about who signed. It also does not cover some documents, including wills, family law such as adoption and divorce, court orders, and notices of default, foreclosure or eviction under a credit or rental agreement for a primary residence. See the text of 15 U.S.C. 7001, 7003 and 7006. We read only the federal law, not state law or law outside the United States. We are not lawyers, and this is not legal advice.
Cost
For one person on the cheapest plan that sends for others, DocuSign Personal is $120 a year, SignFree Pro $119.88, eSign.com Premium $179.88 and PandaDoc Starter $228. SignNow, which has no free plan, starts at $96 a year for 100 invites a year. Loop is $49, paid once.
Loop includes a 14-day free trial that starts on first run, and Loop asks for no payment to begin it. During the trial a small "Shared with Loop" badge shows on the pages your clients see, and it goes with a licence. Your files are stored in your own Cloudflare account, and Cloudflare may ask for a card when you switch storage on.
Verdict
There is no single winner, so choose by what you need.
- To sign a PDF you received: Preview or Adobe. Both are free, and nothing has to be sent.
- To send one now and then, free: PandaDoc, Dropbox Sign or Zoho Sign. Each has a small monthly cap.
- To send many for free as one person: SignFree. Read its limits first.
- To send under your own brand, see when it was opened, and pay once: Loop.