eSign PDF Guide
Your landlord sent a lease. Your boss sent an offer letter. HR sent a W-4. None of them require a printer. Here's how to sign everything from your phone.
Every year, billions of documents get printed just to be signed and scanned back in. It's wasteful, slow, and completely unnecessary. Your iPhone has everything you need to sign any PDF without touching paper. The ESIGN Act (2000) made electronic signatures legally equivalent to handwritten ones. That was 26 years ago. Yet most people still print, sign, and scan because they don't know there's a better way. E-signature apps let you draw, type, or import your signature directly onto the PDF. Add dates and form fields. Export as a permanent, tamper-proof document. The whole process takes less time than walking to a printer.
People print PDFs to sign them for three reasons. First, they don't know about mobile signing apps. Second, they tried Apple Markup and it didn't work well enough. Third, they don't trust that digital signatures are legal. Let's fix all three. Mobile signing apps like eSign PDF handle the entire workflow: import, sign, fill, export. They're faster and produce better results than print-sign-scan. Apple Markup fails on multi-page documents, can't add dates or checkboxes, and creates removable signatures. A dedicated app solves all of these problems. And yes, electronic signatures are legally binding. The ESIGN Act in the US and eIDAS in the EU both recognize them. Your landlord, employer, and bank all accept them. The print-sign-scan workflow is over.
If someone emailed it, open the attachment. If it's in your Files app, you're already set. If it's a physical document, scan it with your phone's camera. eSign PDF's built-in scanner captures clean, high-quality scans ready for signing.
Import the PDF into eSign PDF. The app handles any PDF size and page count. AI detection highlights where your signature, date, and name should go. No hunting through pages trying to figure out where to sign.
Draw your signature with your finger, type it with a handwriting font, or import a photo of your real signature. Add the date, fill in text fields, check boxes. Your signature is saved so you never have to redraw it. Place it on multiple pages if needed.
Export the signed PDF. Signatures are flattened into the document permanently. Share via email, AirDrop, or Messages. Save to Files for your records. The recipient gets a clean, professional document that looks better than a scanned printout.
eSign PDF replaces your entire print-sign-scan workflow. Import any PDF, sign with your preferred method, fill form fields, and export a tamper-proof document. Everything stays on your device. No account, no uploads, no internet needed. Your documents are more secure than printed copies sitting on a shared printer. And you save time, paper, and ink.
Yes. The ESIGN Act (US, 2000) and eIDAS (EU) recognize electronic signatures as legally equivalent to handwritten ones. Banks, landlords, employers, courts, and government agencies all accept them.
Wet signatures are rarely required anymore. But if someone insists, you can draw your signature with Apple Pencil in eSign PDF using the Fountain pen style. It's virtually indistinguishable from a real pen signature on a scanned document.
Better, actually. A flattened PDF signature can't be removed or tampered with. A printed and scanned signature is just an image that degrades in quality each time it's copied. Digital is more secure and more professional.
Yes. eSign PDF works completely offline. Sign, fill, and export documents without any internet connection. Perfect for signing on a plane, in a meeting, or anywhere without Wi-Fi.