Portable Document Format (PDF)

PDF is a file format used to present documents in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. Each PDF file encapsulates a complete description of a fixed-layout flat document, including the text, fonts, graphics, and other information needed to display it.

See the reference side-by-side comparison Common image file formats

	PDF
Developed by	Adobe (until 2008) ISO (since 2008)
Year	1993 (first version) 2017 (PDF 2.0)
Pros	Lossless Protects intellectual property Maintains printed format
Cons	Longer browser loading times Non-editable content Not great for complex graphics printing Not really useful as a graphic image
Features
Vector graphics	Yes
Raster image	Yes
Lossless	Yes
Animation support	No
Transparency support	No
Layers support	No
HDR
Maximum bit depth
CMYK support (for print)	Yes
Maximum number of channels
Commonly used for	Fixed layout flat documents
Browser support (without plugin)
Google Chrome	Yes
Microsoft Edge	Yes
Safari	No
Firefox	Yes
Opera	Yes
Internet Explorer	Yes
Additional
File extensions	.pdf
Wikipedia	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portable_Document_Format