Fill and Sign PDFs Without Adobe, on a Server You Own
Adobe charges per seat and stores your documents on their servers. DocuSeal gives your team a full e-signature platform with 12 field types, bulk sending, and a legally binding audit trail. Opsily has it running on EU infrastructure in minutes, one flat monthly fee.
Why Teams Leave Adobe
The cost compounds. The data never really belonged to you.
Per-Seat Bills That Compound
Adobe Acrobat runs around $12.99 per user per month. Add five people who need to send documents, and you are at $780 a year before you sign a single contract. DocuSign is worse: per-seat plus per-envelope fees stack on top of each other. DocuSeal costs nothing to run if you host it yourself. A flat Opsily plan covers your whole team, no matter how many people send or receive.
Data You Cannot Audit
Adobe and DocuSign are US-based cloud platforms. Your signed contracts, NDA attachments, and onboarding forms sit on servers you have no visibility into. For EU teams subject to GDPR, that is a real problem, not a hypothetical one. DocuSeal on Opsily runs in Frankfurt. You are the data controller.
Complexity Built for Lawyers, Not Your Team
Adobe Acrobat was designed for PDF power users. Most teams need to send a contract, collect a signature, and move on. DocuSeal's drag-and-drop form builder takes minutes to learn. It works in the browser. No installs, no plugins, no IT ticket required.
Built for teams who need reliability
What DocuSeal Actually Gives Your Team
Not a PDF viewer. A full document workflow platform that lets you fill and sign PDF without Adobe or any installed software.
12 Field Types, Zero Guesswork
Signature, date, checkbox, text, file upload, phone, email, and more. You drag them onto the PDF. Your signer fills them in. No PDF pre-processing, no Acrobat Pro required. The WYSIWYG builder works entirely in your browser, and the result is a completed, verified document with a tamper-evident audit trail.
Bulk Sending and Automation
Import a CSV or XLSX and send the same document to 500 people in one step. Attach it to a Zapier workflow, a Make.com automation, or an n8n pipeline. DocuSeal has native webhooks and a REST API with $0.20-per-document pricing for embedded use cases. That beats DocuSign's per-envelope model by a wide margin at any real volume.
Mobile-First, Multi-Language
Your signers do not have a desktop. DocuSeal's signing interface is fully responsive: phone, tablet, laptop, it adapts. The UI ships in 7 languages and supports signing in 14. If you are running KYC workflows, real estate closings, or healthcare consent forms across regions, that matters.
Built for teams who need reliability
Why Self-Hosting Makes Sense in 2026
Ownership is not just about price. It is about who answers to whom.
You Are the Data Controller
GDPR Article 28 draws a clear line between a data controller and a data processor. When you use Adobe or DocuSign cloud, they process your data. When you run DocuSeal on Opsily, you control it entirely. That distinction matters when a regulator asks where your signed documents live and how long you keep them.
No Vendor Lock-In, Ever
DocuSeal is AGPLv3-licensed. The code is on GitHub with 2,557 commits and 147 releases. You can inspect it, fork it, or migrate away anytime. Opsily gives you managed hosting, not a platform you are dependent on. Your data exports as standard PDF. No proprietary formats, no ransom when you want to leave.
One Flat Fee for the Whole Team
Opsily plans have no per-seat pricing. Add your entire company as users. Send documents to thousands of external signers. The monthly bill does not change. Compare that to Adobe at $12.99 per admin seat, or DocuSign charging per envelope on top of per-user fees. At 10 users, the math already favors self-hosting by a wide margin.
Built for teams who need reliability
From Sign-Up to First Signed Document in Under an Hour
No DevOps background needed. No Docker commands. Opsily handles the infrastructure.
Choose Your App
Select an app to get started.
Pick a Plan That Fits Your Team Size
Choose between Small, Medium, Large, or Unlimited depending on how many apps you want to run alongside DocuSeal. All plans include EU hosting, SSL, backups, and no per-user limits. Monthly billing, cancel anytime.
Opsily Deploys DocuSeal for You
You confirm your subdomain or bring your own domain. Opsily spins up DocuSeal on a Frankfurt server and hands you login credentials. The typical deploy takes under 5 minutes. No server management, no configuration files.
Upload Your First PDF and Build the Form
Drag your PDF into the DocuSeal builder. Drop in the fields: signature, date, initials, whatever the document needs. Set the signing order if there are multiple parties. Preview it. You are done in the builder.
Invite Your Team and Send Documents
Add teammates as users at no extra cost. Send your first document for signature. Your signer gets an email, clicks the link, fills and signs on any device. You get a notification and a completed PDF with a full audit trail.
Simple, Transparent Pricing
One flat monthly fee covers your whole team. No per-user charges, no per-document fees, no surprises on renewal.
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The Right Choice for Document Privacy
Signed documents contain sensitive information: identity data, financial terms, health records. That data belongs on a server you control, not in a US cloud with terms of service you agreed to without reading.
GDPR Article 28
When you self-host DocuSeal on Opsily, you are the data controller under GDPR Article 28, not a processor's customer. You set retention policies. You own the audit trail. No DPA negotiation required with a US vendor.
EU Data Residency
All data is stored on Hetzner servers in Frankfurt, Germany. No cross-border data transfers to US infrastructure. For financial institutions, healthcare providers, and legal firms operating under EU data residency rules, this is a hard requirement, not a nice-to-have.
Legally Binding Signatures
DocuSeal generates cryptographically signed PDF documents with a tamper-evident audit trail. Each signature is timestamped and linked to the signer's identity. This meets the requirements of the EU eIDAS regulation and the US ESIGN Act for legally binding electronic signatures.
Open Source Auditability
DocuSeal's AGPLv3 code is public on GitHub. Your security team can read every line of the signing workflow. No black-box processing, no hidden data collection. For regulated industries, this transparency is the difference between a vendor you can approve and one you cannot.
Encrypted Backups
Opsily takes 7-day rolling backups of your DocuSeal instance automatically. Signed documents are preserved with encryption at rest. If you ever need to restore a signed document from six days ago, it is there.
Common Questions About DocuSeal Without Adobe
Everything you need to know before switching from Adobe Acrobat or DocuSign to a self-hosted DocuSeal on Opsily.
Yes. DocuSeal is a browser-based document signing platform that requires no Adobe software at all. You upload your PDF, drag signature and form fields onto it using the visual builder, then send it to any signer. The signer opens a link in their browser, fills the fields, and signs. No installs, no Acrobat license, no subscription to Adobe required. The resulting document is a legally signed PDF with a full audit trail.
Run DocuSeal Today, Own Your Documents Tomorrow
Opsily deploys DocuSeal on EU servers in under 5 minutes, one flat monthly fee, no per-user charges. If it is not the right fit, cancel anytime with no cancellation fees and no data held hostage.