Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Adobe Acrobat Sign
Score 8.4 out of 10
Mid-Size Companies (51-1,000 employees)
Acrobat Sign is an e-signature solution that combines simple and secure e-signatures with Adobe Acrobat. With Acrobat Sign, the user can create, sign, send for signature, manage, and track documents from one Adobe platform. The user can create signing experiences for customers and teams by enabling them to sign documents on any device or browser – anytime, anywhere. No additional software download or accounts are needed. As Microsoft’s e-signature solution, Acrobat Sign…
$14.99
per month license
PandaDoc
Score 8.9 out of 10
N/A
PandaDoc headquartered in San Francisco offers their eponymous electronic signature platform for sales teams, containing sales proposal automation and CPQ (configure, price, quote) features, and integration with CRMs.
$19
per user/per month
Pricing
Adobe Acrobat SignPandaDoc
Editions & Modules
Acrobat Standard DC for teams
$14.99
per month license
Acrobat Pro DC with advanced e-sign
$16.99
per month license
Acrobat Sign Solutions
Call 800-685-4192 for pricing
Essentials
$19
per user/per month
Business
$49
per user/per month
Enterprise
Contact sales team
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Adobe Acrobat SignPandaDoc
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesYes
Entry-level Setup Fee$34.99 license per monthOptional
Additional DetailsPandaDoc offers a free eSign plan and 3 paid packages for eSigning and document automation starting at $19 per month per user. All plans include unlimited documents and eSignatures. Evaluations start with a free 14-day trial.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Adobe Acrobat SignPandaDoc
Considered Both Products
Adobe Acrobat Sign
Chose Adobe Acrobat Sign
Using DocuSign for years and then Adobe Acrobat Sign, the decision to try PandaDoc was a surprise but they quickly captured our teams interest and eventually our business. The analytics, drag and drop features for template creation and the ability to modify documents on the fly …
Chose Adobe Acrobat Sign
They are just different. Adobe's number one feature that puts it above it's competitors is that your document, the signing process, all of it exists within Adobe. There is no need to go from Word, to Adobe, to DocuSign. It saves you time and makes life easy for you (and for …
Chose Adobe Acrobat Sign
I like that its incorporated WITH ALL Adobe products so I can create a PDF or edit one and attach my signature RIGHT there or send it off for signature all in one go.
Chose Adobe Acrobat Sign
Adobe Sign has the brand-name edge on the other products. It is towards the upper end of the price range, with features comparable to the others. It would be a stronger contender if it had support and if logging in wasn't such a challenge. Not my first choice, but not a bad …
PandaDoc
Chose PandaDoc
PandaDoc is way easier to use than any other document system that I’ve experienced. The value proposition is definitely better than competitors, both the desktop and mobile user experience is significantly better, the functionality is much more intuitive, and the product is …
Chose PandaDoc
Easier to use. Cheaper. Faster. Less stiff.
Chose PandaDoc
PandaDoc stacks up above and beyond. It's replaced having to create a document in Word, save it to PDF, and then upload it for signature in an e-sign tool. I can create my documents in the editor. Present proposals in presentation mode instead of powerpoint and send directly …
Chose PandaDoc
We selected PandDoc initially for the cost savings and grew very happy with it after using for several months.
Chose PandaDoc
PandaDoc is more accessible and easy to use then several of its competitors which we have trialed but do not match up to all of the functionalities available in this software. Lacking straight forward navigation and all of the field tools offered even in the unpaid version. We …
Chose PandaDoc
PandaDocs is way easier to use on the back end. So much more capabilities and custom field options. Because of this, it makes it extremely easy for recipients to complete fields accurately. Using Adobe, we would have to upload existing documents for signature but with PandaDocs …
Chose PandaDoc
We tried DocuSign first but found the learning curve too steep. PandaDoc was able to launch almost instantly for us.
Chose PandaDoc
We looked at several other products, most notably Adobe and DocuSign. We found PandaDoc to be easier to use and a better value. There might be a couple of additional features with Adobe or DocuSign, but PandaDoc has done everything we've needed for our amount of e-signing needs …
Chose PandaDoc
The free plan from PandaDoc is better than the rest. The paid plans are affordable as compared to the rest.
Chose PandaDoc
PandaDoc is free for what I use.
Chose PandaDoc
While much less powerful, PandaDoc gives much more aesthetic depth.
Chose PandaDoc
PandaDoc's integration with Pipedrive and template design capabilities helped it win out over these other services. Again, the major complaint is not having a radio button in as a form element. It is desperately needed and still means we are hanging on to these other services …
Chose PandaDoc
The main reason we selected PandaDoc was the Bulk Send feature. Our data comes out of other databases in Excel and I didn't want to have to use yet another 3rd party software to load that information before integrating with an eSignature engine. PandaDoc was one of the only …
Chose PandaDoc
We compared it to Adobe Sign but this came out a lot more expensive. PandaDoc is a very reasonable price for the amount you can do on it.
Chose PandaDoc
I don't think that any of these comping products really combine the same ease-of-use with the complexity of use that PandaDoc has. They either are easy to use without enough complexity, or hard to use with too much complexity. PandaDoc hits that fine line in the middle: easy to …
Chose PandaDoc
I think that PandaDoc is on par with DocuSign. Both are better than EchoSign for sure.

I didn't personally choose PandaDoc. This was the product that our company uses, which was easy for me to assimilate to coming from a different company that used DocuSign.
Chose PandaDoc
No comparison to PandaDoc. I needed help building a custom app for zendesk. DocuSign and EchoSign would not even hear out my request. PandaDoc heard us and built it for us, as it brought mutual benefit and expansion of their product. I would do business with them again in a …
Top Pros

No answers on this topic

Top Cons

No answers on this topic

TrustRadius Insights
Adobe Acrobat SignPandaDoc
Highlights

TrustRadius
Research Team Insight
Published

PandaDoc and Adobe Sign are both tools competing in the eSignature software space. PandaDoc’s key feature is eSignature. However, it also supports contract and proposal management. PandaDoc also has a related tool Quote Roller, focused on sales proposal automation.

Adobe Sign, as its name suggests, is primarily focused on eSignature as well. While an increasing number of eSignature products feature advanced functions such as in-app document creation, tracking, and real-time collaboration, a simple eSignature tool is an attractive choice for administrators who need a large number of signatures for a small selection of documents.

Adobe Sign reviewers are primarily working in mid-sized companies and in the Computer Software space. PandaDoc reviewers are primarily small businesses, but have their largest representation industry-wise from Computer Software companies as well.

Features

A key selling point of Adobe Sign is its integration with Adobe Acrobat, which is a commonly used tool for designing and arranging online documents. This allows administrators to seemingly create and alter documents on the fly without inefficient and error-prone editing processes.

PandaDoc really speaks to its utility as a sales support tool. The value proposition from PandaDoc is that using its features can help sales teams “crush their quota from propose to close”. PandaDoc seeks to accomplish this goal by providing insights into document workflows, changes, and analytics to streamline, automate, and improve upon online document management and eSignature user experiences.

Limitations

Adobe Sign’s standard plan features all the necessary capabilities of an eSignature software, however, it does not support advanced eSignature authentication, which is a requirement for some organizations. Adobe Sign’s online support and documentation have also left many reviewers with much to be desired. This makes Adobe Sign difficult to learn or troubleshoot, which is a major con.

PandaDoc’s biggest drawback appears to be its ease-of-use. Many reviewers report that there is a learning curve with PandaDoc and that memorizing its intricacies, especially as they change between upgrades, can make use across large teams and departments difficult. PandaDoc continues to be popular, however, given it has a version available completely free and with a high-rated payment portal.

Pricing

Adobe Sign does not have a free version available. Standard pricing starts at $20.99 per license a month. Each license supports up to 8 users. Enterprises with multiple teams and departments requiring eSignature functionality are encouraged to contact their sales team for customized pricing and access to features outside of the Standard plan.

PandaDoc’s cheapest paid plan starts at $9 per month per user, designed for use by individuals within a department or organization. Its Business plan is $49 per month per user and introduces an unlimited number of created documents, CRM integrations, a content library, custom branding, and workflow tracking.

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Adobe Acrobat SignPandaDoc
Small Businesses
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Score 9.0 out of 10
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Score 9.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
MSB Docs
MSB Docs
Score 9.7 out of 10
MSB Docs
MSB Docs
Score 9.7 out of 10
Enterprises
Box
Box
Score 8.5 out of 10
Adobe Acrobat Sign
Adobe Acrobat Sign
Score 8.4 out of 10
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User Ratings
Adobe Acrobat SignPandaDoc
Likelihood to Recommend
8.4
(227 ratings)
8.9
(269 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.4
(29 ratings)
9.0
(18 ratings)
Usability
8.3
(193 ratings)
8.0
(23 ratings)
Availability
9.0
(5 ratings)
9.1
(4 ratings)
Performance
9.0
(4 ratings)
9.5
(21 ratings)
Support Rating
7.6
(165 ratings)
5.2
(23 ratings)
Online Training
8.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
8.0
(7 ratings)
6.3
(4 ratings)
Configurability
9.0
(3 ratings)
2.8
(3 ratings)
Ease of integration
5.0
(2 ratings)
8.9
(20 ratings)
Product Scalability
8.0
(3 ratings)
8.6
(4 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
9.0
(2 ratings)
9.9
(20 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
9.0
(2 ratings)
6.7
(4 ratings)
User Testimonials
Adobe Acrobat SignPandaDoc
Likelihood to Recommend
Adobe
Organizations with heavy usage inside Adobe product suites will find adoption seamless. However as it is driven on Adobe's platform some users may face challenges but as a whole the same business philosophy drives this as other Adobe platforms - they want your business - all of your business and it presents challenges if you don't agree. Product inculturation has been successful for organizations like Apple and even BMW, but with the global economy it can provide an appearance of elitism, often duly earned, or present unnecessary hurdles for integration which always impacts adoption timing and usage. While I understand and agree (for the most part) with revenue driven product layering, I believe that easier integration and full product availability definitely affect both acquisition and retention numbers. Adobe has a mighty and well deserved pedigree, and if you are aware of and prepared for the challenges I listed - you will probably love this software. If you need to have an easier and larger adoption and rollout, there are other options that will be a better fit especially if one of your data points is monitoring the impact and efficacy of the software on your team's time, conversion metrics and the impact on your clients. Adobe doesn't appear fond of self report analytics. On a side note, Adobe is a HUGE corporation and I have managed several of their enterprise platforms and they are awesome at allowing access to and support of legacy products, but identifying direct support was moderately to extremely difficult and requires a patience and tenacity above what one might expect for a company with whom you contribute significant income for their products. In a time when a new software pops up by the minute, having the heritage of Adobe is rock solid but a little more flexibility would make this product more attractive. I would still recommend the product albeit with awareness and acceptance of aforementioned challenges
Read full review
PandaDoc
It is ideal for going from phone call (or even while on a phone call) to sending an NDA or SOW out to a client. I have done this often, and have found the faster I get them out, the higher the likelihood of getting a signature. While it is more than capable for many proposals, for very complex proposals, numbering in the 100s of pages (not uncommon for complex ERP proposals), it is not the right tool. If you incorporate Powerpoint Slides in your proposals, it is not great for that either.
Read full review
Pros
Adobe
  • Adobe Acrobat Sign tracks whether or not a signer has viewed a document
  • Adobe Acrobat Sign tracks when a signer has signed, and the document has been sent to the next signer
  • Adobe Acrobat Sign sends you confirmation emails and progress update emails along the way
  • Adobe Acrobat Sign provides a "confirmation of signing" page at the end of the document package you put together, to prove the signatures are authentic
Read full review
PandaDoc
  • Complex quoting.
  • API integration for cross platform communication and automation.
  • Easy signing experience.
  • Easy user interface.
  • Excellent engagement and willing to partner with clients.
  • Fantastic training resources (1:1 sessions, webinars, micro-videos, on-demand, articles).
  • Beautiful proposal designs.
  • Integrations - HR, CRM, Payments, CRMs. (Salesforce, HubSpot, Pipedrive, Zendesk, Greenhouse, Lever, etc).
  • Online Notary.
Read full review
Cons
Adobe
  • Not able to customise the UI so we are limited to the standard functionality, but this is mostly sufficient for our needs
  • Basic workflow automation is included but for more advanced routing/conditional logic we need to integrate with other tools such as Power Automate
  • Not currently able to integrate with our SAP ERP systems
  • MFA is currently not possible
Read full review
PandaDoc
  • The visibility of who has completed but not fully signed. I love the dashboard but have to consistently scroll to get back to where I was looking and find interesting agreements to surface where we have not counter signed yet.
  • More calculated fields that are custom to us
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
Adobe
It is by far the easiest service we have used to obtain digital signatures from employees. In the past we had done it by hand (a process I would not recommend for 1500+ employees) and with another company that would not allow us to create our own forms and would charge us for each form.
Read full review
PandaDoc
The reason I gave it a rating of 7 is because it's probable, but not for sure. This is because there are a few little things we don't love about pandadoc. Mostly that there is not conditional logic such as: they must either fill this field out OR this one. Also it's a little pricey. But we'll probably stay because it's good enough and a pain to switch to something new
Read full review
Usability
Adobe
I've had very little trouble with it in all my uses with it. I do wish the text boxes you add wouldn't cut off the text if you entered too many words and that it would adjust it's size to fit within the space you've provided. However, that just takes a little refining in the initial set up of the document before you send it out.
Read full review
PandaDoc
Once you get the hang of it, it's very easy to use. There can be a slightly steep learning curve to get fully in on the system. The new editor v2 has really improved usability and allows us to collaborate on documents simultaneously. Once the templates and library items are set up, a new document, whether it be a sales or HR document, takes very little time to complete.
Read full review
Reliability and Availability
Adobe
I would have rated this a 9 or greater had they not had had such critical outages. They have taken steps to resolve this so I may come in and revise this
Read full review
PandaDoc
We haven't had any real issues regarding downtime as of yet.
Read full review
Performance
Adobe
The Adobe Acrobat Sign's performance are excellent.
When we send electronic document by email for signature all the customers receive it regularly, nobody has any issue to open it and the signature phase was very easy. The user-friendly aspect of this product reduce or reset the call for IT support
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PandaDoc
The documents load quickly for the most part but sometimes if there are larger documents with a high number of variables it could take a bit longer to get the document to show up. Most of the time the document comes on the screen relatively quickly allowing for quick access to documents to be edited and sent out.
Read full review
Support Rating
Adobe
It is a great tool to get signatures from the client and has reduced a lot of overhead that was caused before resulting in very long delays. With the integration of Adobe Acrobat Sign, we have reduced this delay making the process much smoother and more efficient.
Read full review
PandaDoc
Recently I could not upload a pdf to a contract - support was very responsive and easy to work with. They got back to me the next day with an apparent fix - however when I opened the document nothing had changed. I then could not respond to the rep who was helping me because it was a "no-reply address", the problem still has not been solved and we had to make alternate arrangements to get this to the client. Never had it happen before and was only with this one contract.
Read full review
Online Training
Adobe
The best types of training are well integrated into the product and Echosign does this well. As mentioned earlier in my review - there are some areas of functionality that can be difficult to understand ("only I sign") for the novice user. Other areas such as macro usage, bulk signature and so on were easily learned and understood via the online tools.
Read full review
PandaDoc
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
Adobe
We did not use it in the manner that most companies do, so I am pleased with how our company handled implementation. We will be pushing the full company over into Echosign for various processes which will incorporate more of an implementation effect.
Read full review
PandaDoc
Implementation was before the time I was here at Riafox, however, support has been great in assisting to merge spaces and upgrade to 2.0 Editor.
Read full review
Alternatives Considered
Adobe
They are just different. Adobe's number one feature that puts it above it's competitors is that your document, the signing process, all of it exists within Adobe. There is no need to go from Word, to Adobe, to DocuSign. It saves you time and makes life easy for you (and for your clients).
Read full review
PandaDoc
PandaDoc offers a free version with basic features and several tiered pricing options. The pricing is generally considered to be competitive and offers good value for the range of features provided. we often find PandaDoc intuitive and user-friendly. Its interface is designed to facilitate easy document creation and management, even for users who aren't particularly tech-savvy. PandaDoc is known for its robust document management capabilities. It offers a wide range of features such as document creation, a rich content library, customizable templates, and a user-friendly interface for creating interactive and engaging documents. It also includes CRM integrations, automated workflows, and analytics.
Read full review
Scalability
Adobe
At the beginning we assigned Adobe Acrobat Sign just to Purchase Office Department because at that moment we needed a tool that supported us to avoid manual signature and was compliance with remote working.
Now we are using it also in other situation because it help us with time and we can also reduce cost
Read full review
PandaDoc
It's scalable
Read full review
Return on Investment
Adobe
  • When an opposing party tried to sue their attorney and my firm alleging one of us forged their signature on an agreed final order, the verification and security provided by Adobe Acrobat Sign allowed us to have the case promptly dismissed saving tens of thousands in attorney's fees.
  • My firm's malpractice insurance premiums decreased when we began collecting all signatures with Adobe Acrobat Sign.
Read full review
PandaDoc
  • Time saved creating documents. Not copying that answer. I've said that several times in this review already
  • IDK about increasing close rate, but customers certainly aren't afraid to click on a PandaDoc link or attachment
  • Only miniscule, miniscule negative is that it isn't always instant
Read full review
ScreenShots

Adobe Acrobat Sign Screenshots

Screenshot of Send, sign, manage and archive documents with 100% legal e-signatures. Collecting e-signatures is as easy as swipe and tap with Adobe Sign. Sign from any device. Legally binding. Works with multiple apps. extremely cost-effective.Screenshot of Easily send e-signature requests to multiple recipients using Send in bulk feature.  Send a document to multiple people with one click, and every recipient gets their own personalized form ready to sign.Screenshot of Track and manage signatures with Adobe Acrobat Sign.  Get real-time visibility for every document out for signature, and receive notifications when documents have been signed.Screenshot of Create an online web form with Acrobat Sign.  It allows your recipients – whether they’re your employees or customers – to quickly access, complete, and sign critical documents without printing or mailing anything.  You will also get immediate access to the data and signatures.

PandaDoc Screenshots

Screenshot of Custom-designed themes, templates, embedded rich media, and interactivity to give every deal the opportunity to get noticed.Screenshot of Automatic notifications, on-the-fly editing, CRM Integrations, and integrated eSignatures.Screenshot of Reporting, with drill down to the deal level with proposals, to pick which deals to include (or exclude).Screenshot of legally binding eSignaturesScreenshot of Centralized communications to streamline the negotiation process, and make revisions in real-time in a single location.Screenshot of Document analytics displays what’s really happening after documents are sent with real-time reporting on engagement and activity on the documents. This enables teams to respond faster to prospects.