Digital signatures · Published
A visual signature is not a digital signature
Your handwriting placed on a PDF is not an advanced electronic signature. What each one is, what it is worth, and how PDFsigna tells you before you sign.
Most PDF apps call everything “a signature”. PDFsigna doesn’t, because the two things behave differently the day someone disputes the document.
The visual signature
Your handwriting, placed on the page. Free, unlimited, no certificate involved. In the United States that is often enough: under the ESIGN Act and UETA, what matters is intent to sign, consent to transact electronically, and a record that can be retained and reproduced. Courts still weigh the evidence.
In Europe it is at most a simple electronic signature. In PDFsigna’s legal levels it is Simple (visual signature): “Not an advanced signature. Limited evidential weight.”
The digital signature
A cryptographic signature made with your certificate and embedded in the PDF as PAdES. It detects any change made after signing and identifies you. Stated precisely: PDFsigna creates advanced electronic signatures under Article 26 of the eIDAS Regulation, in PAdES format per ETSI EN 319 142.
When you have a certificate, your handwriting goes inside the signature as its appearance.
How you know before you sign
The status band tells you which level you are about to get before you press anything, and the file name says it too:
Contract marked.pdf ← visual signature only
Contract signed.pdf ← digital signature with a certificate
The five levels, with their exact wording, are on the legal levels page.
This article is general information, not professional advice. Laws, prices and how software works change over time: before you decide, check the official, up-to-date documentation from each authority or vendor.