ALL PDF TOOLS37
Sign PDF
Sign a PDF Online — Draw or Place Your Signature
Draw a signature with your pointer or place a PNG, position it on any page, and download the signed PDF.
About Sign PDF
Most signing happens at the last minute: a form comes back, it needs a signature on page four, and the only thing between you and sending it is software you do not have. This page does that job in the tab you already have open. Drop the PDF in, draw your name on the pad with a mouse, a trackpad or a finger, and drag it onto the page. If you already have a picture of your signature, place a PNG or JPEG instead — that path needs no pointer at all, which is how to use this tool from a keyboard. Placement is expressed as three percentages of the page you can see: the left edge, the top edge, and how much of the page width the signature should span. Those three number fields are the placement, so dragging on the page and typing in the fields write the same values and cannot disagree. The height follows your signature’s own proportions rather than being set separately. Pick which page to sign, or put the same mark on every page. The pad exports a transparent PNG trimmed to the ink, so the page shows through around the strokes; a JPEG cannot do that, and this page says so when you choose one. The signature is drawn into the page’s content, which means a reader cannot click it and delete it, and the rest of your document is left alone — the file is loaded, one image is added, and it is written back out. Then be clear about what this is. It puts a picture of your signature on a page. It is not a certificate-based digital signature: no certificate is involved, nothing is cryptographically signed, and the result carries no signature field, so a PDF reader will report no signatures in it. It cannot prove who signed, and it cannot show that the document was altered afterwards. Whether a drawn signature is enough is between you and whoever asked for the document, and this page makes no claim about that. What it does promise is the ordinary one: nothing is uploaded, because the PDF and your signature are read, drawn and written entirely inside this tab.
Questions
Is this the same as a digital signature?
No, and the difference matters. This page draws a picture of your signature into the page, the way a rubber stamp does. No certificate is involved, nothing is cryptographically signed, and the file comes back with no signature field in it — open the result in Acrobat or Preview and it will report no signatures at all. That means it cannot prove who signed, and it cannot show whether the document was altered afterwards. If you have been asked for a certificate-based signature, this is not the tool for it, and this page makes no claim about whether a drawn mark is enough for your document.
Can I sign without a mouse or a touchscreen?
Yes, by placing an image instead of drawing one. The pad needs a pointer — there is no way to draw a signature from a keyboard, and the pad says so in its own label. Switch the signature source to the upload option, choose a PNG or JPEG of your signature, and set the position with the three percentage fields, which are ordinary number inputs you can tab into and type in. Dragging on the page and typing in those fields write the same three numbers through the same clamp, so the picture and the fields can never disagree.
Why does my uploaded signature have a white box around it?
Because it is a JPEG. JPEG has no transparency, so the whole rectangle is drawn — background included — and it covers whatever was under it on the page. Save or export your signature as a PNG with a transparent background instead: a PDF carries a PNG’s transparency through as a soft mask, so only the ink shows. A signature drawn on the pad here is already exported as a transparent PNG, trimmed to the ink.
Can someone delete the signature from the PDF afterwards?
Not by clicking on it. The image is drawn into the page’s own content rather than attached as an annotation object, so there is nothing for a reader to select and remove. That is not tamper-proofing and should not be read as any: anyone with a PDF editor can still alter the page, and nothing in the file would record that it happened. A drawn signature is a mark on a page, not a seal on an envelope.
Can I type my name in a handwriting font instead of drawing it?
No. The only fonts a PDF viewer is guaranteed to have are Helvetica, Times, Courier and two symbol faces — none of them a handwriting face — and this page embeds no font of its own, so a typed name would come out looking like ordinary body text rather than a signature. Draw it on the pad, or photograph or scan a signature on paper and place that PNG instead.
Is my file uploaded to a server?
No. Transmute processes everything locally in your browser using JavaScript and WebAssembly. Your files never leave your device — there is no server, no upload, no cloud processing.