Side by side
PDF.ai API vs PDFtoChat
Both stand on ai pdf assistants. Which one you can start free with, which one lets you read the code, and what each costs once you pay.
Free plan API
PDF.ai API combines PDF parsing, structured extraction, section finding, and Q&A in one HTTP API. Review the operation-specific credit charges and key handling before building it into a workflow.
Visit PDF.ai API Free plan Self-hostedWeb
Choose PDFtoChat if you want to ask questions about uploaded PDFs and value a free account or access to the source code. Consider its stated scanned-PDF restriction and the setup work required for self-deployment before choosing it.
Visit PDFtoChatThe facts
| PDF.ai API | PDFtoChat | |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Open source | Not published | Not published |
| Runs on | API | Self-hosted, Web |
| Lowest paid plan | Paid: $599 a month | Free or on request |
| Plans published | 3 | 1 |
| Maker | Not published | Not published |
| Website | api.pdf.ai | pdftochat.com |
| On ai pdf assistants | #17 of 27 | #21 of 27 |
PDF.ai API: what it does well
- Parse supports OCR, tables, and image extraction
- Extract returns citations linked to PDF segments
- Free plan includes 200 credits/month
- Examples cover cURL, Python, Node.js, and PHP
- Cached Parse results can cost zero credits
What to know first
- Ask requires documents to be parsed first
- Parse and other operations consume credits
- Generated API key is shown only once
PDFtoChat: what it does well
- Free plan lets users chat with PDFs.
- Works with papers, textbooks, and contracts.
- Source code is available on GitHub.
- Can be deployed to Vercel or another host.
What to know first
- Scanned PDFs are not supported.
- PDF image support is listed as future work.
- Self-deployment requires configuring service credentials.
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