Forum Discussion
How to draw on a PDF on Windows and save the changes?
I need to mark up a PDF with freehand notes, circles, arrows, and a few simple shapes without changing the original text. When I open the file in a browser on my Windows laptop, the pencil or drawing...
If you’re comfortable with a little Python, PyMuPDF can add freehand ink, circles, and arrows to a PDF and save them as annotations without changing the original text. Everything runs locally.
The relevant methods are add_ink_annot(), add_circle_annot(), and add_line_annot(). You can set the annotation color and line width, then save a separate copy with doc.save("annotated.pdf").
The catch is that it’s a programming library, not a drawing interface. It works well for scripted markup, but drawing directly with a mouse or stylus would require a separate interface.