App Review: Document Viewer (PDF for Android)

One thing I have certainly learned about Android as an OS is that things we take for granted on a desktop or laptop computer just do not exist on Android. A basic notepad for instance is not a part of Android and may or may not be included by the manufacturer of your tablet or provider of your phone.

Through the years many of us have used Adobe's Acrobat Reader for PDF files on computers. Of course with anything from Adobe it eventually became unnecessarily bloated and other free options such as Sumatra popped up.

Although Android does not have its own PDF reader, many devices do come with a library reader app. Unfortunately what I have seen of those apps, they are bloated, crash prone, and are limited free versions and/or display advertising. Even free PDF readers you can find on Google Play Store are just as crappy and filled with ads. I mean seriously, the BS you have to go through just to open a document on an Android device.

After searching and trying various apps, and much disappointment along the way, I found an app that is completely free. There are no ads! It's not a resource hog. It will open PDF, EPUB, DjVu, XPS, CBZ (Comic Book) and FictionBook (FB2, FB2.zip) files, and display recent files in the traditional bookcase look common to such readers; this one even includes cobwebs on shelves on your bookcase you have not filled yet.

This app is simply called Document Viewer; which is probably why it is difficult to find when searching for a PDF reader. It will work on Android 2.2 and up making it also ideal for older devices. You can get it from APKPure here; you can get it from Google Play via the link at the bottom of the APKPure page.

Document Viewer is definitely on the home page of my tablet and to me makes the tablet more useful.