The coffee mug-clothing iron. The baby stroller-scooter. The world of combined technologies can be strange, but G Suite-compatible PDF editors are one innovation that we think is worth it. On-the-go PDF editing is just one reason.
Even though Google Drive is one of the most popular file storage services on the market, just a small portion of its users are aware of the numerous capabilities available to them. These tools let you open any file on your Google Drive, whether it’s a document, spreadsheet, audio, video, or zip archive. As for pdf files, you can not only open but also edit PDFs in Google Drive without the need to search for a solution outside the Google ecosystem. Here’s how to use PDF editor for Google Drive.
Google Drive itself allows previewing any file in storage, which makes things easier when you only need to check what the file contains. 
However, in the Preview mode, the number of actions available to the user is pretty limited. If we talk about PDF, aside from navigating through the file, you can only add comments to the specific parts of the text that you select, copy selected text, download or print the document.
Google Drive doesn’t offer any PDF editing, meaning you can’t do things like fill out forms or change a PDF’s layout. If you want to rotate a PDF in Google Drive, place a PDF signature or stamp, or make other changes to a PDF, going through Google Drive is not possible.
One common workaround is converting the PDF into a Google Doc. By doing so, you can edit any information in the file and then saved it back to PDF.
The good thing about transforming your PDF file into a Google Doc lays in the fact that it’s fast and you don’t need any additional programs to convert your files. Also, thanks to the built-in OCR functionality of Google Drive, you can even transfer the text from the images of the PDF file to the doc file, where you can further edit it as you will. Technically speaking, this is an online PDF editor of Google Drive.
The significant downside of this Google Drive PDF editor is that it works only with the converted doc file. This means that you risk losing your images and formatting since the doc.file format is not designed to process visual information the way a PDF is. Many more editing tools also remain unavailable if you need to edit your PDF from Google Drive.
So, for those who are wondering how to rotate pdf in google drive, move, crop, stamp pages, sign pdf from Google Drive, use freehand tools and many more features, Google Drive offers third-party solutions that can be installed and fine-tuned in minutes without leaving storage.
One of the most popular solutions to edit PDFs in Google Drive is Lumin PDF. The app is already included in the “Open with” recommendations in Drive, so finding it is a cinch. Even better, so is using it.
After choosing Lumin PDF as your PDF editor for Google Drive, you will be able to open your PDF files in a new tab with numerous editing capabilities available. The solution offers two editing modes: “Viewer” and “Manipulation”.
In the Viewer editing mode, you can access tools that allow editing pages as you go through the file. There is a diverse selection of annotation options that include adding extra text, images, tools for drawing and adding shapes, stamping, and signing. By using the format menu in this mode, you can also change the size, style, color or font of the annotation.
In the Manipulation editing mode, you can work with the file structure by rotating, deleting, moving, cropping and adding any number of pages.
Also, you can invite other people to collaborate with you in editing your PDF files by sending an email request or sharing a public link with them. Later on, you will be able to see the activity of all collaborators on the notification panel.
The great thing about third-party PDF solutions like Lumin PDF is that it can be synchronized with your Google Drive storage so you don’t have to download your PDF file from the drive, edit it with an online or desktop solution, and then upload it back to the cloud. At the same time, it gives you more capabilities while working with your PDF files than a default Google Drive PDF Viewer.
Want to earn more about Google Drive PDF solutions? Check out more articles on how to use PDF editors on mobile and working together with teammates.
