The welcome window of PDF Textfix puts the free version in one sentence:

Free to try. Your first 5 line edits save clean. After that, saved files carry a watermark until you buy once.

Here a document is the file as you opened it. Its edited lines are counted once while it stays open, however often you save it.

What counts as one line edit?

A line is what the Lines pane lists, one line of text as PDF Textfix reads it. Changing one character or all of them is the same single line edit. Correcting the demo letter’s date from October 6 to October 7 is one; in the file, that line is one text object:

BT 11 0 0 11 451.8 700 Tm /TT2 1 Tf [ (6 Octob) -10 (er 2026) ] TJ ET
  • An edited line counts once per document, when a save writes it without the watermark, however often you save while the file is open.
  • Reopen the saved file and change that line again, and it is a new line edit.
  • A save that adds the watermark uses none.
  • The samples in Help > Open Sample PDF never count and are never watermarked.
  • Printing never counts a line.

Where does PDF Textfix keep the count?

On your Mac: in a ledger file in the app’s Application Support container, mirrored in its user defaults. There is no account, and the free version never contacts the licence service, so the count belongs to the Mac. Settings and About show what is left, such as “Free version: 3 of 5 free line edits left on this Mac.” Once they are used, the line under the pages says “Free allowance used: files saved with edits carry a watermark. Buy once to remove it.”

What happens after the free line edits?

PDF Textfix keeps saving your edits, with a watermark on every page: a gray diagonal “PDF Textfix · free version”, a small logo in the corner and a footer line. The footer and the logo open the pricing page, or PDF Textfix on the Mac App Store in the Mac App Store version. A file whose pages cannot take the watermark is saved without it, and the Issues pane says so.

The sheet titled Save with a watermark? over the demo letter in PDF Textfix. It says the free allowance of line edits on this Mac is used, names the small logo in the corner, quotes the line every saved page will carry, says the line and the logo open the pricing page on pdftextfix.com, and offers Buy PDF Textfix, Enter Licence, Cancel and Save with Watermark.
The first watermarked save after PDF Textfix starts asks first and quotes the footer.

Buying once removes it: an in-app purchase in the Mac App Store build, a licence in the direct build. Both count line edits the same way; Mac App Store or direct download compares them, and pricing lists the prices. The manual’s free-version section has the details.

Questions about line edits

Does saving the same file again use more line edits?

Not while the file stays open: saving it again adds nothing for lines already counted. If you reopen the saved file and change the same line again, that is a new line edit, because PDF Textfix counts the lines of each version of a file it opens.

Do the free line edits apply per document or per Mac?

Per Mac, across every document you edit on it.

Can I print edits in the free version?

Yes, once they are saved: “Save the changes first, then print.” Edits past the free line edits print only from the saved file, which carries the watermark.