Skim
Skim is a macOS PDF reader and note-taking app built for reading, annotating, and presenting PDF documents, especially academic papers.
What is Skim?
Skim is a native macOS PDF reader and annotation app that helps users read, study, and present PDF documents. It is especially popular for academic and research workflows because it combines PDF viewing with searchable notes, highlights, snapshots, and navigation tools that make long documents easier to review. You can open PDF, PostScript, and EPS files, search document text, browse tables of contents and thumbnails, and export notes for later use. Skim also supports full-screen reading, presentation mode, bookmarks, and integration features that fit well into document-based Mac workflows. Published by Christiaan Hofman, it is best suited to people who regularly work with articles, papers, manuals, and other reference PDFs on macOS.
Key features
- Read and print PDF documents on macOS
- Add notes and highlight important text in PDFs
- Search inside documents and jump to matching results
- Navigate with thumbnails, table of contents, and bookmarks
- Create snapshots for quick reference while studying
- Use full-screen and presentation modes for focused reading
- Export notes as text or save them alongside documents
- Work with LaTeX-related PDF workflows such as SyncTeX and PDFSync
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Safety overview
Status: Safe
Skim is a legitimate PDF reading and annotation app for macOS. Access to your files is normal for its purpose because it needs to open, save, annotate, and export document content. Notes and highlights may be stored with the document or in related files and bundles, so use care when moving, compressing, or sharing annotated PDFs if you want to preserve your markup.
Recommendation: Keep Skim if you use it to read or annotate PDFs on your Mac. Remove it only if you no longer need its PDF notes, reading tools, or document workflow features, and make sure any annotated files you want to keep have been saved in a format that preserves your notes.
Common paths
/Applications/Skim.app
Preference paths
~/Library/Preferences/net.sourceforge.skim-app.skim.plist
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