Once you use Foxit you may never go back to your previous PDF software.
December 04, 2018

Once you use Foxit you may never go back to your previous PDF software.

Julián González | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with FoxitPhantom PDF

Bloomstar is an organization with 350+ employees in four locations across Canada.
During the last year we have been updating our software and now we use Foxit as our default software to manage PDF documents.
Foxit Reader has the feeling of a full PDF software and is intuitive and friendlier than other PDF readers. The Phantom version offers all the capabilities of editing, signing documents, sharing, presentations, etc. However, it is still in the transition stage where some users have a local license of a different PDF editor but soon will be using Foxit Phantom too.
Document filing and storage is probably the most common use of Foxit at Bloomstar, especially related to human resources where all employees documents are now filed electronically. In our industry there are a lot of new seasonal hires during floral holidays and using a friendly PDF tool to manage the employees files is very convenient.
  • One thing that stands out is the way Foxit manages all the tabs of the opened documents. It probably sound simplistic but it has the feeling of a web browser like Chrome, but better because when you have a lot of opened documents, you don't get these microscopic tabs that get smaller and smaller, instead you can use arrows that go left-and-right and you can see your tabs and actually read what they are. Similar to the worksheets tabs in the lower part of an Excel file where you can move sideways to keep looking all your worksheets in a document, but even better -again- because you also have a top-right drop-down arrow that will show the full list of documents in a drop-down window, this is similar to the favorites tabs in Chrome where you have a limited number of favorites on the top bar and the rest of them are shown in a list.
  • Foxit is interconnected with their online application. When you want to convert a PDF document into a different type like Word for example, you just click on the extras menu on the top, select convert to Word and then it is interesting that it actually opens your browser and goes to Foxit Online. The great advantage that I see with this process is that you get instant connectivity with everything because Foxit will give you all the available options to store your converted file and that can be Google Drive, Dropbox, One Drive, etc, and of course, your local drive.
  • Mobility is an advantage. Your user is independent of your installed software in your computer. You can access anywhere online, you can have all your store documents in the cloud and if you don't have access to your computer where you have Phantom installed it doesn't really matter because you can pretty much do everything on Foxit Online, so it gives you all the mobility you need.
  • One thing that can be a problem for some users is that at least when running on Windows 10 you can easily find yourself opening PDF files with Microsoft Edge when what you really want is to use Foxit. Somehow Edge overrides the default reader for PDF files and you need to know how to set your default program and do it manually. This is not a particular problem of Foxit but it would be nice to prevent Edge from overtaking the PDF files.
  • Foxit does so many things that it takes time to get familiar with all the small icons that are pretty much everywhere around your interface. You have this tiny quick access tool bar on the top left and some others on the top right, then a couple more on the lower middle. The only problem that I see is that they are tiny and I understand that we all want to maximize the working area on the screen but there could be an option to make them bigger.
  • One downside for some users is that you need to be logged in to your user. I mentioned this as an advantage because it gives you all the connectivity but on the other hand if you don't have internet access or you want to work as a stand-alone user it may be complicated.
  • For a PDF software in a our company is difficult to translate the software performance into financial results. With a PDF software is a lot less obvious than an ERP of a Payroll System, but one advantage could be the savings that a lower cost of licensing would bring when it is used by a bigger number of users.
  • A positive impact is the ease of use when creating and filing new hired employees, but once again, it is hard to say that it is faster than a different PDF software and even if that was the case the savings in time would be probably unnoticeable. At least one would be having a process with no hassles when creating and saving your PDF documents for your employees.
  • So far no crashes. I have never heard a complain about Foxit crashing even when you have dozens of documents opened at the same time. We can't say the same when using other applications like Excel... This brings peace of mind and less frustrated users.
I would say that when you want to get a bigger share of the market and take business from long time consolidated applications like Acrobat, you really need to try harder and give something more to the user to be able to change their mind and switch to Foxit.
In our case licensing was an important factor and at the beginning we had a small learning curve with users asking how to open PDF files and what was that orange icon. The truth is that we as users accepted the new software happily because simply said: it does the job.
After using Foxit I would not go back to Acrobat, I like better the connectivity, the simplicity and the way it manages the tabs.
FoxitPhantom is very good for sharing files, commenting on files with coworkers, and converting files into other formats. It is also excellent to save your files in every cloud service you use, no matter which one you use. For a basic user who only needs to read PDF documents, a full version like FoxitPhantom is less appropriate and the free reader would be a better option.