Acrobat Sign allows for a variety of signatures, from basic electronic signatures to highly secured digital certificates issued by a third-party provider.

The most commonly applied is the electronic signature, where the recipient simply Types or Draws their signature into the field. These signatures are placed into the agreement with a line under the signature and a print version of the name and date under that.

When the line and text are visible, this signature is considered "well-formatted" as the signature space is clearly defined, and the print version of the name and date will be readable:

Examples of the Typed and Drawn signature types with the blue line and print text undeerneath.

Well-formatted signatures are optional but enabled by default.

Turning off the signature formatting displays only the signature script:

Examples of the Typed and Drawn signature types without the blue line and print text undeerneath.

A secondary control exists to manage the length of the blue line when the signature is applied.

When dynamic line adjustment is disabled, the blue line travels for the full width of the signature field as placed when authored.
When dynamic line adjustment is enabled, the blue line is adjusted to be displayed as slightly longer than the Typed/Drawn name or the print text under the line, whichever is longer.

Availability:

The "well-formatted" signature controls are available for Acrobat Standard, Acrobat Pro, and Acrobat Sign Solutions license plans.

Configuration scope:

Well-formatted signatures can be enabled at the account and group levels.

How it's used

Once configured by the administrator, no further interaction is required (nor allowed) by the sender and recipient.

Best practices

Determine if the added lines and text are helpful or cumbersome in terms of how you would develop your document templates.

Companies that generate a lot of custom (ad hoc) forms may find that a well-formatted signature provides an excellent signature representation by only placing one field.
Companies that commit to designing templates may find the added text interferes with the formal signature layout, which would commonly have dedicated space to add discrete FullName and Date fields.

Consider what types of signatures you'll accept. The blue line and text are not inserted if you accept Images or Stamps as a signature. This leads to an inconsistent appearance if you get both Images and Typed signatures on the same document. This inconsistency does not legally impact the signature validity, but it's clearly "different" in appearance and can solicit questions.

Generally speaking:

If you only accept Typed and Drawn signatures, leaving well-formatted signatures enabled is recommended.
If you accept a mix of signature types and typically only have one signer per agreement, and your internal auditor doesn't mind, leave well-formatted signatures enabled. Having the printed name under a Drawn signature can be helpful.
If you accept a mix of signature types and collect multiple signatures per agreement, turn off well-formatted signatures to ensure that the blue text isn't added to only some of the signatures. People suspect inconsistencies in legal documents, so don't buy questions if you can avoid them.
This control has no impact if you never allow Typed and Drawn signatures. You should probably just leave it as you found it.

Configuration

To review and edit the feature controls:

There are two controls in this feature set.

The configurable options are:

When well-formatted signatures are disabled, the blue line and text are not applied. The width of the signature field has no impact on how the signature is displayed.

Three images of the signature: The first showing the field placement during authoring; the second showing the signature field on the e-sign page; the third showing the signature on the final PDF.

Four images of the signature: The first showing the field placement during authoring; the second showing the signature field on the e-sign page; the third showing the signature on the final PDF with a short name; the fourth shows the signature on the final PDF with a long name..

Note:

The Time/Date stamp applied under the signature uses the time zone of the recipient applying their signature.

If a default date format has been selected for the group, the time/date stamp will conform to that formatting pattern.
If no date format has been selected, the format will be: (Month Day, Year Time TimeZone) e.g., Aug 18, 2024 14:30 ADT)

The time zone is included in the stamp to provide context for the signature relative to other events.

Things to know

The blue line and text under the signature are not visible if the signature:

is an image
is a stamp
allows for a Signing Reason

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Well-formatted signatures - Control the line and print text

Control the signature font, the blue line, and the underwritten name and date