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Add to SafariWhen comparing Adobe Reader vs Sumatra PDF, the Slant community recommends Sumatra PDF for most people. In the question“What are the best PDF viewers for Windows?” Sumatra PDF is ranked 1st while Adobe Reader is ranked 13th.
Specs
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Integrated cloud service
Gives access to a cloud service that allows storage and sharing of PDF files.
Pro Allows comparing two separate PDF files for differences
Reader can compare two versions of a PDF file and highlight differences.
Pro Best in class compatibility with the PDF standard
Since Adobe is the creator of the PDF standard, it stands to reason that Adobe's Acrobat Reader has the best support for it.
Pro Starts quickly
Pro Free and open source
Sumatra is available for free, licensed under GPL with source code available on GitHub.
Pro Low resource usage
Pro Does not have heavy editor features
Annotations and other heavy features are just not needed in reader.
Pro Extensive keyboard shortcuts
Pro Elegant interface
Pro Portable
The application consists of a single file that can be run without installation. You can put it on an external device, such as an usb thumb stick and run it on any Windows machine from the thumb stick.
Pro Multilingual
It's available in 69 languages.
Cons
Con No Distribution version of the installer
Adobe only provide exe files and do not provide an msi installer for bulk deployment
Con Lack of support
Adobe support openly admitted to not supporting the product and recommend the use of forums.
Con Proprietary / Monopoly
Con Data Breach in 2013
Con Software feels slow and bloated
Con No way to auto-update for standard users - needs admin credentials to update
Con Windows only
Con Lacking in features
Sumatra aims for simplicity at the expense of functionality. For example, there's no way to annotate PDFs or edit them.
Con Fonts are not smooth enough
Not as smooth as e.g. Adobe Reader. No anti-aliasing
Con Cannot crop empty fields
Just got used to this killing feature on Goodreader on Mac.
