Smallpdf alternative

Smallpdf AI Question Generator Alternative: PDF to Quiz and MCQ Maker

Smallpdf's question generator is one tool inside a 30-plus tool PDF suite. PDFQuiz does nothing but turn documents into quizzes, so you get question type control, an answer key, class sharing and grading on top of the generation step.

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Short answer

The Smallpdf AI Question Generator is a free-to-try feature bundled into Smallpdf's PDF suite. It reads a PDF, DOC, XLS, PPT, PNG or JPG and returns multiple choice, true or false or open ended questions with the answers. The best alternative depends on what you do next: if you only need questions on screen, Smallpdf is fine, and it also compresses, merges, signs and edits PDFs. If you need to control the question mix, keep a separate answer key, assign the quiz to a class or a team, collect scores and export a printable PDF or an editable Word file, a dedicated quiz tool like PDFQuiz covers the whole job instead of the first step.

Last updated August 2026. Smallpdf details verified against smallpdf.com/question-generator and smallpdf.com/pricing on August 20, 2026.

File formats supported
PDF, Word, PPT, images
Question types
Five, including MCQ
Export options
PDF and Word

Why people look for a Smallpdf alternative

A quiz tool, not a PDF suite with a quiz feature

Smallpdf has been around since 2013 and is genuinely good at what it was built for: compressing, converting, merging, signing and editing PDFs. The AI Question Generator was added to that suite, and it does the generation step well. The friction shows up afterward. A teacher who has just generated 20 questions still needs to choose which ones survive, print a version with the answers and a version without, hand it to 30 students and see who got what. A trainer needs the same thing with a completion record attached. That is a different product, and it is what a document-first AI question generator like PDFQuiz is built around.

Five question types, not three

Smallpdf generates multiple choice, true or false and open ended questions. PDFQuiz adds fill in the blank and matching, so a single upload can produce a mixed-format exam rather than one uniform block of questions.

Answer key you can separate

Export the quiz with the answer key for yourself and without it for the class. Both tools show you the correct answers on screen. Only one of them gives you two clean documents at the end.

Assign it and get scores back

Send a link, let people take the quiz online, and read the results in a dashboard. Sharing, grading and certificates sit on the Teacher plan and above, which is the part a PDF utility does not try to cover.

Same source files, same OCR

You are not giving anything up on input. Drop in a PDF chapter, a Word study guide, a PowerPoint lecture, plain text or a photo of a page. Scanned documents are read too, so old handouts still work.

Edit before anyone sees it

AI writes the first draft. You reword a clumsy stem, fix a distractor that is obviously wrong, drop the two questions that missed the point and set the difficulty. Nothing goes out graded without your review.

Seats and roles for teams

Both vendors sell team tiers. If your use case is training a department rather than editing shared PDFs, the seat you are paying for should include assessment results, not page compression.

PDFQuiz vs Smallpdf AI Question Generator

Side by side, including where Smallpdf is the better buy. Both read your document and write questions from it. The split is what happens after the questions appear.

Feature PDFQuiz Smallpdf AI Question Generator
What the product is A dedicated document to quiz tool One feature inside a 30-plus tool PDF suite
Source files PDF, Word, PowerPoint, text, images PDF, DOC, XLS, PPT, PNG, JPG
Scanned pages and OCR Yes Yes
Question types Multiple choice, true or false, fill in the blank, short answer, matching Multiple choice, true or false, open ended
Answer key Yes, and exportable separately from the student copy Yes, correct answers are shown with the questions
Export PDF and editable Word Within the Smallpdf workspace and its PDF tools
Assign to a class or team Yes, share by link on Teacher and Business plans Not part of the tool
Scores and results dashboard Yes, on Teacher and Business plans No
Other PDF editing tools No, quizzes only Yes, compress, convert, merge, sign, edit and more
Try without an account Yes, generate before you pay Yes, Smallpdf states no signup is needed
Best for Teachers, trainers and exam prep who assign and grade Anyone who also needs a general PDF toolkit

Smallpdf column checked against smallpdf.com on August 20, 2026. Features change, so confirm on their site before buying.

How much does Smallpdf cost, and how does PDFQuiz compare?

Here is the part most comparison pages get wrong, so read the caveat.

Smallpdf prices by region, so a single dollar figure is not honest. Plenty of roundups publish one number as if it were universal. When we loaded smallpdf.com/pricing on August 20, 2026, it served euros, and the yearly toggle was preselected with a 25 percent discount badge against monthly billing. The tier structure is stable and worth knowing, but the amount you see depends on where you are and which billing term you pick. Check smallpdf.com/pricing yourself rather than trusting any figure quoted second hand, including ours.

Plan structure PDFQuiz Smallpdf
Free tier Try the generator before paying 1 user, 30-plus tools, limited document downloads
Entry paid plan Student, 49 USD per year (about 4 USD per month) Pro, 1 seat, priced per region
Plan for educators Teacher, 99 USD per year (about 8 USD per month), adds sharing, grading, certificates No separate educator tier on the pricing page
Team plan Business, 350 USD per year, 5 seat minimum (about 29 USD per month) Team, per seat, 2 to 19 seats
Enterprise Business plan with roles, central billing and domain control Business, 20-plus seats, custom quote
Billing terms Semester or annual, cancel anytime Monthly or yearly, yearly discounted

PDFQuiz prices are the list prices on our own pricing page. Smallpdf tiers reflect their pricing page structure on August 20, 2026.

Simple process

Generate questions from a PDF in three steps

1

Upload the document

Drag in a PDF, Word file, PowerPoint deck, text file or a photo of your notes. Narrow it to a page range if you only need one chapter.

2

Choose the question mix

Pick multiple choice, true or false, fill in the blank, short answer or matching, set the count and the difficulty, and generate.

3

Share, grade or export

Edit anything you want changed, then send a link to a class, collect the scores, or export a PDF or Word file with or without the answer key.

Who should switch, and who should stay

We would rather you buy the right tool than the wrong one.

Switch: teachers and instructors

You need a printable student copy, a separate key, and a record of who scored what. Turn a chapter into a graded assessment with the PDF to quiz maker, or build a whole unit of multiple choice questions in an afternoon.

Switch: corporate trainers

Onboarding decks, compliance manuals and product sheets become knowledge checks with a completion record. If your job is proving people absorbed the material, the results dashboard is the feature you are actually buying.

Stay with Smallpdf if

Question generation is occasional and your real daily need is compressing, converting, merging, signing or editing PDFs. In that case one Smallpdf subscription covers more of your week than a quiz tool will, and we are not a replacement for it.

Smallpdf alternative: frequently asked questions

Is the Smallpdf AI Question Generator free?

You can run the Smallpdf AI Question Generator without an account, but the free Smallpdf plan is capped. Smallpdf's own pricing page lists the Free tier as one user with limited document downloads, and paid plans start at the Pro tier for a single seat. Heavier use pushes you onto a subscription.

What is the best Smallpdf alternative for making quizzes from PDFs?

If quizzes are the reason you opened Smallpdf, PDFQuiz is the closer fit. Smallpdf is a 30-plus tool PDF suite where question generation is one feature. PDFQuiz does only the document to quiz job, so it adds question type control, an answer key, class sharing, grading and PDF or Word export.

How much does Smallpdf cost?

Smallpdf sells four tiers: Free for one user, Pro for one user, Team priced per seat for 2 to 19 people, and Business for 20 or more seats at a custom rate. The displayed amount and currency change by region and by whether you pick monthly or yearly billing, so check smallpdf.com/pricing for your own number.

Can I generate multiple choice questions from a PDF?

Yes. Upload the PDF, pick multiple choice as the question type and set how many questions you want. PDFQuiz reads the document and writes each question with one correct answer plus plausible distractors, then hands you an answer key you can export or hide from students. The same flow works for a PDF to MCQ conversion of a whole chapter.

Does it work with scanned PDFs and images?

Yes. Both tools read scanned pages. PDFQuiz accepts PDF, Word, PowerPoint, plain text and image files such as JPG and PNG, so a photographed page of handwritten notes or a scanned textbook chapter still produces questions.

Can I generate questions and answers from a PDF automatically?

Yes, both tools return the correct answers alongside the questions. The practical difference is what you can do with the key. PDFQuiz exports the answer key as its own document so you can hand out a clean student version, which matters as soon as the quiz is graded rather than self-study.

Are AI-generated questions accurate enough to grade?

They are accurate enough to be a strong first draft, and quality tracks the clarity of the source document. Read the questions and the key before anything counts toward a grade. Every question in PDFQuiz is editable, so the tool drafts and you approve, which is the workflow accreditation reviewers expect anyway.

Do I need an account to try it?

No. Upload a document in the box at the top of this page and generate questions to judge the output on your own material. An account is only needed when you want to save quizzes, share them with a class or team, or collect results.

Generate your questions on your own document

Upload a PDF, Word file or slide deck and compare the output against what you get elsewhere. Free to start, no manual typing.

Build your first quiz free

Related tools and comparisons

Convert PDF to quiz The core tool for turning any PDF into an interactive quiz. AI question generator Generate questions and answers from any source document. Multiple choice quiz maker Build MCQ tests with distractors and an answer key. PDF to MCQ Turn a chapter straight into multiple choice questions. Knowt alternative Another comparison for people shopping study tools. Pricing See plans and pick the capacity that fits your work.