How to Redact a PDF without Adobe Pro

One of the biggest benefits to the PDF format, apart from universal compatibility and ease of sharing, is the variety of security features on offer. Password protection, encryption, and digital signatures are some of the options available, but what if you want to hide parts of a document while preserving its format? Enter PDF redaction - permanently removing visible text and obscuring confidential or sensitive information from PDF documents to ensure privacy and security.

Adobe Acrobat Reader is considered to be the industry standard for redacting PDF files, but it’s not always accessible or straightforward to use. In this guide, we’ll explain how to redact using our feature-rich C# library, IronPDF, as well as recommend a couple of alternative redaction tools which offer basic functionality.

IronPDF: The Premier C# PDF Library

IronPDF is a lightweight .NET PDF library designed specifically with web developers in mind. PDF conversion is just one of many uses - it makes reading, writing, and manipulating PDFs a breeze, and you can use it in your .NET projects for both desktop and web. The best part - it’s free to try out in a development environment.

One of the main advantages of IronPDF is its flexibility. It can be used as a standalone desktop application or integrated into your web application using the IronPDF API. Additionally, IronPDF is compatible with both Windows and Mac operating systems, making it accessible to a wide range of users.

Redacting PDF Files - Getting Started

Create Your Project in Visual Studio

First of all, open Visual Studio and go to File -> New Project -> Console Application. Enter your project name, choose the location you want to save it to, and hit the Next button. Select the latest .NET Framework and then Create. Once your project is up and running, it’s time to add our library.

Install the IronPDF Library

IronPDF is easy to use but it’s even easier to install. There are a couple of ways you can do it:

Method 1: NuGet Package Manager Console

In Visual Studio, in Solution Explorer, right-click References, and then click Manage NuGet Packages. Hit browse and search ‘IronPDF,' and install the latest version. If you see this, it’s working:

You can also go to Tools -> NuGet Package Manager -> Package Manager Console, and enter the following line in the Package Manager Tab:

Install-Package IronPdf

Finally, you can get IronPDF directly from NuGet's IronPDF Page. Select the Download Package option from the menu on the right of the NuGet page, double-click your download to install it automatically, and reload the Solution to start using it in your project.

Didn’t work? You can find platform-specific help on our Advanced IronPDF NuGet Installation Instructions.

Method 2: Using a DLL file

You can also get the IronPDF DLL file straight from us and add it to Visual Studio manually. For full instructions and links to the Windows, MacOS, and Linux DLL packages, check out our dedicated IronPDF Installation Guide.

Add the IronPDF Namespace

Always remember to kick off your code with the IronPDF namespace, like this:

using IronPdf;

using IronPdf;

Imports IronPdf

How to Redact a PDF File using IronPDF

Now that we have our project and added the library, it’s time to create our redacted PDF file. With IronPDF, we redact text by specifying phrases to be automatically scanned for and censored. In this example, we’ll be redacting text from the PDF document provided in the tutorial.

using IronPdf;

class Program
{
    static void Main()
    {
        // Load the PDF document from a file
        PdfDocument pdf = PdfDocument.FromFile("novel.pdf");

        // Redact 'are' phrase from all pages
        pdf.RedactTextOnAllPages("are");

        // Save the redacted PDF as a new file
        pdf.SaveAs("redacted.pdf");
    }
}

using IronPdf;

class Program
{
    static void Main()
    {
        // Load the PDF document from a file
        PdfDocument pdf = PdfDocument.FromFile("novel.pdf");

        // Redact 'are' phrase from all pages
        pdf.RedactTextOnAllPages("are");

        // Save the redacted PDF as a new file
        pdf.SaveAs("redacted.pdf");
    }
}

Imports IronPdf

Friend Class Program
	Shared Sub Main()
		' Load the PDF document from a file
		Dim pdf As PdfDocument = PdfDocument.FromFile("novel.pdf")

		' Redact 'are' phrase from all pages
		pdf.RedactTextOnAllPages("are")

		' Save the redacted PDF as a new file
		pdf.SaveAs("redacted.pdf")
	End Sub
End Class

In this example, we load the file novel.pdf and, using the RedactTextOnAllPages method, choose to redact the word ‘are’ from the entire document. Then we save our redacted PDF as ‘redacted.pdf’. This is the output file:

Alternatively, RedactTextOnPage and RedactTextOnPages can be used to censor sensitive information on one or multiple pages, respectively.

Alternate Redaction Tools

Microsoft Word

Microsoft Word has been a cornerstone of document creation and editing for decades. However, its PDF redaction tools leave a lot to be desired - requiring you to manually select each and every section of text you want to redact and edit or replace it manually.

How to Redact a PDF File using Microsoft Word

• In Microsoft Word, open your PDF file
• Word will prompt you to convert the PDF to an editable document. Select OK to proceed
• Using the Highlight tool, choose the color black, select the text you want to redact, and apply
• Go to File, Save As, and export your document as a PDF file

pdfFiller

pdfFiller is an online software platform which boasts plenty of features to allow users to customize and manipulate PDF files - including redacting sensitive information. However, it’s also a very manual process, requiring you to draw shapes over the text you’d like to censor.

How to Redact a PDF File using pdfFiller

• Open pdfFiller's Redaction Tool in your browser
• Upload a PDF document from your system
• Select the Blackout tool in the top bar
• Draw shapes over the text you want to redact
• When you’re finished, click Done in the top right corner
• Save your document as a PDF in the box that appears

Conclusion

And that’s how to redact PDF files without using Adobe Acrobat. Microsoft Word and pdfFiller are easy to use and offer a range of basic editing features. However, for a more powerful PDF redaction tool, IronPDF offers flexibility which cannot be matched.

And PDF redaction is just the start - with HTML to PDF conversion, PDF formatting tools, built-in security and compliance features, and more, IronPDF is the number one tool for all of your PDF document needs.

Ready to get your hands on IronPDF? You can start with our IronPDF 30-day Free Trial. It’s also completely free to use for development purposes so you can really get to see what it’s made of. And if you like what you see, IronPDF starts as low as $749 Pricing Details. For even bigger savings, check out the Iron Suite Licensing Packages where you can get all nine Iron Software tools for the price of two. Happy coding!