DocuSign vs PandaDoc vs Dropbox Sign: e-signature pricing depends on what you're actually signing

Watch for the seat minimums in this category — they change the real price more than the plans themselves suggest. Dropbox Sign's Standard plan is listed at $25/user, but it has a two-seat minimum, which quietly turns a "$25/month" plan into $50/month for a solo user who just wants to send one contract a week. Its Essentials tier, $15/month, has no such minimum and is the better starting point if that's you.

DocuSign runs $15–40/user/month depending on tier, with a Personal plan at $15 that covers basic sending and signing. PandaDoc starts lower on paper, from $9/month, with more complete plans around $19/user annually — but PandaDoc isn't really competing on "cheapest e-signature," it's competing on being a **document workflow tool that happens to include signing**: proposal and quote templates, content libraries, approval workflows, and payment collection built into the same document.

| | Entry price | Actually built for |
|---|---|---|
| Dropbox Sign Essentials | $15/mo | simple send-for-signature, no minimums |
| DocuSign Personal | $15/mo | pure signing, broadest brand recognition |
| PandaDoc Starter | $19/user/yr | sales docs — proposals, quotes, contracts, with signing built in |

If the job is genuinely just "get a PDF signed" — a lease, a simple contract, a one-off agreement — Dropbox Sign Essentials or DocuSign Personal both do that cleanly at the same $15 entry price, and DocuSign's brand recognition means the person signing has usually seen the interface before, which reduces friction. If the job is closer to "build and send a sales proposal, track when it's opened, and collect a signature and payment in the same document," that's specifically what PandaDoc is for, and paying for pure e-signature tools to replicate that workflow with separate documents and a separate payment link is the harder, more expensive path even at a lower headline price.