Support

That depends on how a book arrived.

Copied into the library. A book added with Import a Copy, shared to Foldleaf from another app, or saved from the arXiv, Project Gutenberg or Web browsers is copied into the app’s own storage on your device. That storage is private to the app, so it doesn’t appear in the Files app, and moving or deleting the original elsewhere leaves your library as it is.

Edited in place. A PDF opened from Files with Edit in Place stays where it is — in iCloud Drive, On My iPad, Dropbox, or another app’s folder — and the library keeps a link to it, marked on its cover. Your ink and highlights are written into that file when you tap Save, so they go wherever the file goes. Touch and hold the book and choose Show File Location to find it in Files. Deleting it from the library removes only the link, never the file.

Edit in Place keeps one file: the right choice for a PDF that lives in iCloud Drive or Dropbox, that other apps also open, or that you want your annotations saved into. Import a Copy gives the library a copy of its own, which nothing outside the app can change or remove.

Foldleaf asks each time you open a PDF from Files. To stop it asking, choose one under Opening PDFs in Settings.

Not by itself, but a PDF edited in place syncs wherever its file does. One in iCloud Drive can be opened on your iPad and your iPhone alike, and your annotations travel with it once saved. The rest of your library stays on each device, and is included in that device’s own backup.

Yes. Install the Dropbox app, then turn Dropbox on as a location in the Files app: in Files, tap Browse, then the More button (•••), choose Edit, and switch on Dropbox.

Open a PDF from Dropbox in Files, choose Edit in Place, and Foldleaf works on the file in your Dropbox itself. When you tap Save, your ink and highlights are written into it, and Dropbox syncs the change to your other devices and to anyone you share the file with. Other storage services that appear in Files work the same way, as long as they let apps edit their files in place.

Share a PDF and your ink and highlights go with it, as standard PDF annotations that Preview, Acrobat and other readers show. A PDF edited in place already has them in the file itself, once saved. EPUBs are shared as they are.

Deleted books wait in the Bin, at the end of the library’s folders, for a week, or however long you choose in Settings, from a day to a year. Open the Bin to put a book back in the folder it came from.

Deleting an edited-in-place book only ever removes Foldleaf’s link to it; the file itself is still where it was.

Every feature is free for 14 days from when you start the trial. After that, reading, your library, the paged view and the plain page colours stay free, and so does everything you’ve already marked or cropped.

Page curl, scrolling, the zoom locks, the paper colours, Crop View, the pen, the highlighter, controls down the side, and Back and Forward unlock with a single purchase. It is not a subscription. Page curl, the way books open, has its own 14 days from the first book you open, trial or not.

Sign in with the same Apple Account, then tap Restore Purchases at the top of Settings (the gear in the library). One purchase covers your iPhone and your iPad.

Yes. Turn off Apple Pencil Only in the pen’s or the highlighter’s menu. A finger then draws, so scrolling takes two.

Yes. Annotations, bookmarks and reading positions are kept with each book and carried across updates.

Deleting the guide is final until an update brings a new edition of it, which then appears at the top of your library.

Not at present.