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Test scope & comparison notes
These are recorded facts, not a unified ranking. Tested tiers and scope are not consistently recorded. Read pricing with its date and timing with its conditions. Privacy observations reflect visible flows and statements, not a security audit.
Cross-task capability coverage across selected products
Each product is scored independently per task edge; switch tasks below while keeping shared products selected| Task edge | Soda PDF | sejda.com | Switch / compare |
|---|---|---|---|
| PDF to Word | 88/100 DOCX · Output attached | 74/100 DOC · Output attached | Active task |
| PDF compression | Not tested in topic | 95/100 PDF · Output attached | Compare in task topic → |
| Scanned PDF OCR | Not tested in topic | 95/100 PDF · Output attached | Compare in task topic → |
| PDF merge & split | 89/100 PDF · Output attached | 97/100 PDF · Output attached |
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Browse this task →| Criterion | Soda PDF Online PDF to Word 88/100 Seven-aspect task score Automatic login-free conversion retains text and tables; free frequency and size limits apply, with no immediate deletion control observed and a stated 24-hour retention. Tested export DOCX · Output attached Historical test · 2026-10-18 | Sejda PDF to Word PDF to Word 74/100 Seven-aspect task score Upfront free limits, no-login ad-free export, and 2-hour auto-deletion; however, it outputs legacy .doc without native tables, suiting text extraction. Tested export DOC · Output attached Historical test · 2026-10-19 |
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| Pricing & rules | ||
| Pricing plans | Soda PDF USD web/desktop Pro, Team and Business; annual team bill uses default 3 seats · 2026-10-20 Plan · source date Monthly / one-time Annual bill / period Quota & limits Free online conversion2026-10-20 ↗ Free Free Free FAQ says “2 files per day or 3 MB”; the rule is ambiguous. Advanced features require payment; arbitrary free exports are not guaranteed. Soda PDF Pro2026-10-20 ↗ USD 12.5/month USD 89/year Monthly 1-month licence; web and desktop access; monthly renewal amount not separately checked in checkout. Annual 1 seat, actual first-year bill USD 89; annual renewal USD 129; optional device/phone-support add-ons cost extra. USD 89 first year, then USD 129 every 12 months until cancelled Soda PDF Team · per seat2026-10-20 ↗ USD 11.25/month — Monthly Per-seat 1-month licence, 3–19 seats; not the team total. Soda PDF Team · 3-seat total2026-10-20 ↗ — USD 240/year Annual Default 3-seat first-year total USD 240; card says 80 per seat first year, then 129 per seat/year; other seat counts require a new quote. USD 80/seat first year, then USD 129/seat every 12 months; total depends on seats Soda PDF Business2026-10-20 ↗ USD 20/month USD 198/year Monthly 1-month licence; web and desktop tools. Annual Actual annual bill USD 198, renewing at 198 every 12 months. USD 198 every 12 months until cancelled 7 plan / billing-period records, all listed; — means that period is not recorded. Annual order totals checked without payment: Pro USD 89 first year, renewing at 129; Business 198/year; default 3-seat Team first year 240 (card says 80 per seat). The Team monthly card shows 11.25 per seat, not the 3-seat total. All seat tiers, optional add-ons and taxes were not exhaustively verified. Verification has gaps; unknown prices and quotas are not inferred. Cancellation, sources & verification recordCheckout states automatic renewal, cancellable through the account or support. Full conditions of the 30-day refund guarantee were not separately verified. Official feature and pricing page ↗ · 2026-10-20 Capture 1 ↗ Official feature and pricing page ↗ · 2026-10-20 Capture 1 ↗ Official feature and pricing page ↗ · 2026-10-20 Capture 1 ↗ Official feature and pricing page ↗ · 2026-10-20 Capture 1 ↗ Official feature and pricing page ↗ · 2026-10-20 Capture 1 ↗ Official feature and pricing page ↗ · 2026-10-20 Capture 1 ↗ | Sejda personal web and desktop plans (Free / Web Week Pass / Web Monthly / Desktop+Web Annual); USD · 2026-10-21 Plan · source date Monthly / one-time Annual bill / period Quota & limits Free2026-10-21 ↗ Free Free Free No account required; documents up to 50 pages or 50 MB and up to 3 tasks per hour; files automatically deleted after 2 hours. Web Week Pass2026-10-21 ↗ USD 5 · one-time payment Usage / one-time Usage / one-time One-time payment of USD 5 for 7 days of Sejda Web access (unlimited documents, no page or hourly limits, up to 500 MB per file; excludes Sejda Desktop). One-time payment; does not auto-renew Web Monthly2026-10-21 ↗ USD 7.5/month — Monthly Sejda Web monthly subscription (unlimited documents, no page or hourly limits, batch multi-file processing; excludes Sejda Desktop). Recurring monthly billing; cancel anytime Desktop+Web Annual2026-10-21 ↗ — USD 63/year Annual Billed annually at USD 63/year (save 30% over monthly), including 1 year of unlimited access to both Sejda Web and Sejda Desktop. Recurring annual billing; cancel anytime 4 plan / billing-period records, all listed; — means that period is not recorded. The converter page states the free allowance (documents up to 50 pages or 50 MB, 3 tasks per hour, files deleted after 2 hours); the official pricing page (/upgrade) lists the 7-day Web Week Pass (USD 5 one-time payment), Web Monthly (USD 7.50/month), and Desktop+Web Annual (USD 63/year). Cancellation, sources & verification recordWeb Week Pass is a one-time 7-day payment with no auto-renewal; monthly and annual plans use recurring billing and can be cancelled anytime. Sejda official pricing and upgrade page ↗ · 2026-10-21 Capture 1 ↗ |
| Free & trial allowance on the test date | Free guests can convert standard single files without login; high-volume batch jobs and full online editing require a Soda PDF plan | Unauthenticated free users can run up to 3 tasks per hour for documents up to 50 pages or 50 MB |
| Cancellation & refunds | Checkout states automatic renewal, cancellable through the account or support. Full conditions of the 30-day refund guarantee were not separately verified. | Web Week Pass is a one-time 7-day payment with no auto-renewal; monthly and annual plans use recurring billing and can be cancelled anytime. |
| Disclosure of costs & limits | Zero-friction direct conversion and download | Page limit (50 pages), file size limit (50 MB), and 3-tasks/hour quota are disclosed upfront below the hero upload button |
| Task quality | ||
| Measured fixture results | Text retained: 100% · Editable table cells: 16 · Page 2 preserved: Yes | Text retained: 100% · Editable table cells: 0 · Page 2 preserved: Yes |
| Fixture findings | Converted automatically with text and editable tables retained; scans and long documents were not tested. | Retains 100% of text and table values across both pages, but exports legacy OLE .doc without native editable tables (table_count = 0). |
| Original historical observation | Soda PDF Online delivers veteran commercial quality: auto-converting upon upload in 14.3s and exporting a super-compact 5.5 KB .docx with 100% text retention and 16 native Word table cells (02_workspace.png, 03_download.png). | Sejda excels in upfront quota transparency and privacy restraint (91/100 Honesty), exporting an unwatermarked document in 11.36s without login and retaining 100% of text across both pages—however, it delivers a legacy binary OLE2 .doc (215.0 KB) rather than modern .docx and does not reconstruct native Word tables (table_count = 0). |
| Suitable uses · historical assessment | Office users seeking a clean, ad-free, no-login converter that accurately rebuilds native 16-cell Word tables (<w:tbl>) | Users who value upfront no-login quotas (≤50 pages/50 MB, 3 tasks/hr) or a $5 7-day pass without auto-renewal and primarily need full text extraction |
| Result & output evidence | ||
| Scans / OCR | The fixture is a text PDF; scans and OCR were not tested | The fixture is a text PDF; scans and OCR were not tested |
| Delivery capabilities | ||
| Recorded export specifications | DOCX · Output attached · No watermark in test | DOC · Output attached · No watermark in test |
| Historical specification note · not an official maximum | Full 2-page native .docx (5.5 KB, 46 paragraphs + 16-cell native table, watermark-free) | Full 2-page watermark-free legacy .doc (OLE2 Word 97-2003, 215.0 KB) |
| Watermark observation | No watermark | Watermark-free |
| Batch & API | Supports local file and Google Drive / Dropbox cloud imports and exports | Paid plans unlock batch multi-file processing and the offline Sejda Desktop application |
| Recorded free-tier dimensions | Not verified | Not verified |
| Attached file dimensions | Not verified | Not verified |
| Published allowances & file limits · not tested | Free online conversion: FAQ says “2 files per day or 3 MB”; the rule is ambiguous. Advanced features require payment; arbitrary free exports are not guaranteed. | Free: No account required; documents up to 50 pages or 50 MB and up to 3 tasks per hour; files automatically deleted after 2 hours. |
| Speed & reliability | ||
| Timing observation | Network-observed server wait: 12.8s · End-to-end reference: 14.3s | Network-observed server wait: 11.36s · End-to-end reference: 11.36s |
| Date & fixture | 2026-10-18 · anchor_pdf2word_v1 · US-West (California, AS2914) | 2026-10-19 · anchor_pdf2word_v1 · US-West (California, AS2914) |
| Repeated tests & reliability | No standardized repetition count, success rate or variability range is recorded. | No standardized repetition count, success rate or variability range is recorded. |
| Interaction experience | ||
| Account requirements | No login in this test | No login in this test |
| Sign-in methods | No login required for standard single-file conversion | No login required for free conversion; optional Pro account sign-in |
| Manual adjustment | Not verified | Not verified |
| Interaction observations | Clean, ad-free commercial interface that automatically starts conversion upon upload and presents a clear blue 'Download file' button on the same page (02_workspace.png, 03_download.png). | Converts our 2-page anchor PDF via the "Edit text" mode and downloads the full document without login, ad pop-ups, or email capture gates. |
| Background & reputation | ||
| Service lifecycle notice | Not verified | Not verified |
| Operator | Avanquest Software / LULU Software (sodapdf.com) | Sejda BV (Amsterdam PDF Utility Vendor) |
| Recorded origin | Montreal, Canada | Amsterdam, Netherlands |
| Domain history record | 2010–Present (16-year commercial PDF software suite) | 2016–Present |
| Background & reputation assessment | Developed and operated since 2010 by Montreal-based LULU Software / Avanquest Software Group, a veteran North American PDF software vendor. | Operated since 2016 by Amsterdam-based Sejda BV, a well-established developer of web and desktop PDF tools affiliated with the open-source PDFsam team. |
| External reputation record | Not verified | Not verified |
| Engineering & privacy | ||
| Processing location | Uploaded for cloud processing | Uploaded for cloud processing |
| Third-party tracking record | Not verified | Not verified |
| Engineering & privacy assessment | Full SSL encryption with automatic 24-hour server file deletion. | HTTPS-encrypted transfer; explicitly commits on both landing and download screens to automatically delete uploaded and converted files after 2 hours, alongside a manual immediate-delete option. |
| Retention statement | Claims deletion within 24 hours; deletion not independently verified | Claims deletion within 2 hours; deletion not independently verified |
| Evaluation basis | ||
| Pricing transparency | 28 / 35 Supports direct no-login drag-and-drop PDF-to-Word conversion and exports a full unwatermarked .docx (01_landing.png, 03_download.png), subject to daily free task frequency and file size limits. | 32 / 35 Directly discloses the free allowance right below the upload button on the landing page ("Documents of up to 50 pages or 50 MB and 3 tasks per hour. Files stay private. Automatically deleted after 2 hours"); the official /upgrade page transparently lists the 7-day Web Week Pass ($5 one-time payment, no auto-renewal), Web Monthly ($7.50/mo), and Desktop+Web Annual ($63/yr). |
| Interaction restraint | 26 / 30 Clean, ad-free commercial interface that automatically starts conversion upon upload and presents a clear blue 'Download file' button on the same page (02_workspace.png, 03_download.png). | 27 / 30 Converts our 2-page anchor PDF via the "Edit text" mode and downloads the full document without login, ad pop-ups, or email capture gates. |
| Background & reputation | 18 / 20 Developed and operated since 2010 by Montreal-based LULU Software / Avanquest Software Group, a veteran North American PDF software vendor. | 18.5 / 20 Operated since 2016 by Amsterdam-based Sejda BV, a well-established developer of web and desktop PDF tools affiliated with the open-source PDFsam team. |
| Engineering & privacy | 13.5 / 15 HTTPS-encrypted transfer; explicitly commits on both landing and download screens to automatically delete uploaded and converted files after 2 hours, alongside a manual immediate-delete option. | |
| Task quality | 61 / 65 Excellent OpenXML reconstruction: 100.0% text retention (4/4 headings, 3/3 body phrases, Page 2 verified) and 100% native Word <w:tbl> table reconstruction (4 rows, 16 cells, 12/12 data values intact) in a compact 5.5 KB file (61.0/65) | 43 / 65 Exports a valid legacy OLE2 Word 97-2003 .doc file (215.0 KB): isolated LibreOffice import and macOS textutil inspection confirm 100.0% text retention (4/4 headings, 12/12 table text entries, 3/3 key body phrases, and Page 2 verification token preserved), but table cells are not reconstructed as a native editable Word table (table_count = 0, with 3 inline graphic objects) (43.0/65) |
| Deliverable specifications | 17.5 / 20 Exports a complete, unwatermarked 5.5 KB .docx with no login required (17.5/20) | 14 / 20 Delivers a complete 2-page watermark-free document (215.0 KB, free quota ≤50 pages/50 MB, 3 tasks/hr) without login, but outputs legacy binary OLE2 .doc rather than modern OpenXML .docx, incurring a format specification deduction (14.0/20) |
| Processing speed | 11.5 / 15 Auto-converts upon upload in ~14.3s without requiring an extra Convert click (11.5/15) | 10 / 15 2026-10-21 single-sample network timing: file upload takes 1.07s (POST /api/files/upload), and pure server conversion from POST /api/tasks (operation: pdfToWord) to polling completion (GET /api/tasks/[id]/change) takes 11.36s (10.0/15) |
