Sign a PDF online

Visual signature vs digital signature

These are different things, and the difference matters if anyone might dispute the document later.

A visual signature — what this tool makes — is a picture of your signature drawn onto the page. It looks exactly like signing and scanning, without the scanner. It is accepted for everyday business: internal approvals, delivery notes, most commercial agreements, anything where the parties already trust each other.

A digital signature is cryptographic. A certificate issued to you binds your identity to the exact bytes of the document, so any later change breaks the signature visibly. This is what regulated contexts mean by a qualified electronic signature, and it is what standards like PAdES describe.

We cannot produce one, and we will not pretend otherwise. It requires a certificate from a trust service provider, which cannot be issued to a web page. If you need one, use a certificate-based service.

Getting a good-looking signature

Drawing works best with a finger on a phone or a stylus on a tablet — a mouse produces a shaky line that looks like a mouse drew it. If you only have a mouse, typing usually looks better.

Uploading gives the most authentic result: sign a white sheet of paper in black ink, photograph it in good light, and remove the background before uploading. A PNG with transparency sits on the page cleanly; a photograph brings its paper with it, including any shadow.

Around 25% of the page width suits most signature blocks. Much larger starts to look like a stamp rather than a signature.