Stirling PDF

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🟢 Beginner⏱️ ~10 min to installYou save €9/mo

Stirling PDF is iLovePDF without the account, the ads or the cap, on your own server or even on your computer. You open a web page and you get 60+ tools: merge, split, reorder, compress, convert both ways (Word, images, HTML, PDF/A), sign, fill forms, watermark, redact, password-protect, extract images, and OCR to make a scan searchable. There are even pipelines to chain several operations on a whole folder. Everything runs in a single Docker container, the file stays on your machine from start to finish. It is the most followed PDF project on GitHub, 92,000+ stars and 30 million downloads. The core is MIT licensed; the enterprise-only parts (SSO login, audit logs) sit in a Team plan at €99 a month, which you do not need for yourself or a small team.

92.4kView on GitHub ↗

Versus iLovePDF Premium: the match

Price
Stirling PDF
€0, on your server or your computer
iLovePDF Premium
€9 a month, €60 yearly
Where your files go
Stirling PDF
Nowhere, they stay with you
iLovePDF Premium
To their servers, for the processing
File size and count
Stirling PDF
No cap, it is your machine
iLovePDF Premium
Unlimited on Premium, capped on free

iLovePDF Premium ↗

VS	Stirling PDF	iLovePDF Premium ↗
Price	€0, on your server or your computer	€9 a month, €60 yearly
Where your files go	Nowhere, they stay with you	To their servers, for the processing
File size and count	No cap, it is your machine	Unlimited on Premium, capped on free
OCR	Included, several languages	Premium only
Signatures	No limit	5 a month on Premium
Automating a whole folder	Pipelines and API included	Separate paid API

How to install it (even from zero)

A single Docker container, a single command. On your computer it is ready in five minutes; on a server, add an HTTPS proxy and a login. The prompt does it all.

Paste this prompt into Claude (Code or Desktop)

It installs Docker if missing, runs Stirling PDF from the project's official image and opens it in French:

Installe Stirling PDF sur ma machine (la boîte à outils PDF open source, repo GitHub Stirling-Tools/Stirling-PDF) avec Docker, en suivant la doc officielle docs.stirlingpdf.com. Pars de zéro : vérifie que Docker est installé, sinon installe-le. Crée un dossier stirling-pdf avec un docker-compose.yml qui lance l'image docker.stirlingpdf.com/stirlingtools/stirling-pdf:latest sur le port 8080, avec des volumes pour ./stirling-data/configs, ./stirling-data/tessdata, ./stirling-data/logs et ./stirling-data/pipeline, la variable SYSTEM_DEFAULTLOCALE=fr-FR et restart unless-stopped. Si c'est mon ordinateur personnel, mets SECURITY_ENABLELOGIN=false et ouvre http://localhost:8080. Si c'est un serveur exposé sur internet, garde la connexion activée, change tout de suite le mot de passe du compte admin (identifiants par défaut admin et stirling) et mets un reverse proxy Caddy devant qui sert mon nom de domaine en HTTPS avec un certificat automatique, sans publier le port 8080. Vérifie en fusionnant deux PDF de test. Explique chaque étape simplement, je débute.

Review the GitHub repository and check whether it is safe to install given my machine and my infrastructure. Ask me as many questions as possible, using widgets, to clarify my request and be as precise as you can.

2
Pick your favourite tools
The home page lists the 60 tools. Pin the ones you use (merge, compress, OCR): they move to the top.
3
If you expose it on the internet, login is mandatory
Without a password, anyone could process PDFs on your server. Keep login on and an HTTPS proxy in front.

What you actually do with it

Compress and merge your quotes, invoices, contracts

You drop your files, choose the order, get one lightweight PDF back. Without a site that keeps a copy.

Make a scan searchable with OCR

A scanned document becomes a PDF where you can search a word and copy the text. Handy for admin paperwork.

A whole folder at once

Pipelines chain several operations (compress, watermark, convert) on every file of a folder, no clicking.

Project health, at a glance

Before installing an open-source tool, one question matters: is the project alive? These scores are computed from public GitHub data. They are not made up.

98/100

Excellent

Very active, well-maintained project: go ahead with confidence.

Activity: 100
Maintenance: 100
Community: 100
Maturity: 90
Momentum: 100

The repo in numbers

GitHub stars: 92.4k
Forks: 8.7k
Contributors: 291
Commits: 6.1k
Project age: 3.6 yrs
Last commit: today
Size: 474.2 MB
License: Other

Built with

TypeScript 45.6%
Java 45.4%
Python 3.6%
CSS 2.4%
Shell 0.7%

Scores computed automatically from the GitHub API (last-30-days activity, update freshness, community size, project age). Refreshed daily.

Loucash’s take

9/10

If you pay for iLovePDF, you pay to lift artificial limits on operations your computer does perfectly well on its own. Stirling PDF gives you all of it back, no account, no ads, no cap, and your documents never leave your machine. For client or admin paperwork, that is the part that matters. What I like: the breadth of it. 60+ tools, built-in OCR, pipelines to process a whole folder, and a huge project behind it, 92,000 stars and weekly updates. The install fits in one command. What may bite: the interface is dense, you will not use it fully on day one. And there is a company behind it with an enterprise offer; the core stays MIT licensed, but keep an eye on what moves to the paid side. For a freelancer, nothing that matters is locked today.

It’s for you if: You handle PDFs every week (quotes, invoices, scans, client files) and you want neither to pay nor to send those files to a third party.