I need to spot any differences between two versions of a PDF report for work but manually checking page by page is taking forever. Tried opening them side by side on my laptop yet still miss small changes. Is there a quicker way to compare two PDF files?
That is annoying, especially with reports full of tiny wording changes. I usually use Adobe Acrobat’s Compare Files tool, which gives you a marked-up summary and highlights changes page by page. If the PDFs are scans, run OCR first or the comparison can be unreliable. On my old laptop I also keep the files local rather than in a synced folder, as it runs noticeably quicker.
Had the same thing last month checking two versions of a construction report. What worked for me was Adobe Acrobat’s Compare Files tool, it flags added, deleted or changed text pretty clearly. I still double check the highlighted pages because it can miss some layout stuff. If you don’t have Acrobat I would try converting both PDFs to Word and comparing those, though formatting often breaks.
I use Word for this, since most folks already have it. Copy the text out of each PDF into 2 separate documents, then go to Review and Compare to see the changes highlighted. It won’t catch picture or layout shifts, but for wording it saves me hours.
I deal with revised contracts on site all the time, so I know how tedious side-by-side checking gets. I just use PDFcap to handle this sort of thing. It highlights the differences between two documents, saving you from reading every single line. It’s a real lifesaver when clients try to sneak in changes. What kind of device are you using to read them?