KPDF: My new favorite PDF viewer

During the last couple of yours using Linux I’ve basically used every available PDF viewer that is available. Firstr (thanks to being bundled with KDE) KGhostview, then I went to Adobe Acrobat Reader for Linux because of the better compatibility (to be honest I’m not sure anymore why I switched but this is a good guess ;-) ), then to XPDF because of its simplicity and speed. Since last winter I’m also often using GGV and previously GPDF because of me being a Gnome user. In the last couple of month I’m more or less using all of them depending on my motivation and the weather.


Yesterday I’ve tried the new KPDF that is bundled with KDE 3.4 … and I really love it. It is fast, simple and offers everything I want:

  • A “table of contents” sidebar (see Figure 1)
  • A page-preview sidebar
  • Speed
  • A really powerful selection tool (see Figure 2)
  • KPDF also remembers the last position in a document so that you start on the same page when reopening the document later.
  • Fast mouse scrolling: Ok, this may sound trivial, but I really like navigating through my docs with my mouse wheel and KPDF simply has the right speed for me ;-)
Table of contents screenshot

Screenshot of the TOC-sidebar

Table of contents screenshot

Screenshot of the selection feature

Note: The logo screenshot is taken out of the about-screen-