Foxit Reader

A newer version of Foxit Reader is available.

• 5.0 stars

  "Competent PDF Reader - Small footprint"

  April 5, 2011  |   By GrahamSivill

  Pros

  Reads PDFs without the bloat of Adobe's reader and as a result of less code probably has less vulnerabilities than Adobe Reader.

  Cons

  Can't think of any.

  Summary

  I am an IT consultant and have recommended to all my clients that they remove Adobe Reader, mainly as it has become the target for so many exploits that might compromise the user's PC, but also because Foxit Reader takes up 11MB of disk space versus 210MB for the last version of Adobe Reader I looked at.
  
  The other issue I have with Adobe Reader is that it puts a quickstart program into your Windows startup, (probably because it has become so bloated that it needs to preload itself so that when you do eventually want to open a PDF you don't have to wait 10 minutes for it to appear. Personally I don't read that many PDFs so I DON'T want a PDF Reader wasting my RAM when I mioght not use it in a day.
  
  Foxit doesn't suffer this problem, it starts very quickly (slightly slower than it used to, but that is because it now scans the PDF before starting up to check for malicious code), you can turn this feature off in the settings but in the current environment I wouldn't recommend that.
  
  I tend to use PDF readers for just that, displaying PDFs. I think Adobe's reader has many features that I will never use hence its bloatedness, which for other users may not be in Foxit so they may have to stick with Adobe's reader.
  
  If you are like me, go with Foxit. In fact I would say to the guys at Foxit Software, please do not keep adding more and more functionality and make Foxit as bloated as Adobe's version. To me there is no need to bloat a basic PDF reader with functions that 99% of the user base will never use. I would say it would be better to have a reader that is stripped down to the basics with no other features than necessary for reading and printing a PDF and have a more bloated version that does all the other things that presumably Adobe's does.
  
  Get this and remove Adobe Reader, it will make your PC run faster thanks to not having Adobe Reader partially loaded all day.
  
  Siv

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1 reply to this review

• Reply by viviencaloy on May 10, 2011

  I agree with you mr. sivill. Adobe is heavy on the load and thats why Thanks to foxit.

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