---
title: "React Native PDF annotation syncing | Nutrient SDK"
canonical_url: "https://www.nutrient.io/guides/react-native/instant-synchronization/annotation-sync/"
md_url: "https://www.nutrient.io/guides/react-native/instant-synchronization/annotation-sync.md"
last_updated: "2026-06-09T10:24:43.327Z"
description: "Discover how to effectively sync documents using PSPDFKit Instant. Follow our step-by-step guide for seamless integration and enhanced productivity."
---

# Syncing PDF annotations in React Native

By default, Nutrient Instant automatically synchronizes annotations with your Document Engine instance in real time. This is configurable, and you can instead choose for it to sync manually when your app requests it.

Using a network, especially a cellular network, is one of the most energy-intensive tasks on mobile devices. While we do our best to minimize the energy impact of Instant, it can be reduced further by disabling listening for changes from the server or by syncing less often after local changes are made.

Syncing after making local changes and listening for server changes can be configured separately. However, syncing always sends all local changes and fetches all changes from the server. It isn’t possible to fetch remote changes without pushing local changes or to push local changes without fetching remote changes.

## Automatic syncing

By default, when you show a document managed by Instant in  an [`InstantPdfFragment`](https://www.nutrient.io/api/android/nutrient/com.pspdfkit.instant.ui/-instant-pdf-fragment/index.html) on Android and an [`InstantViewController`](https://www.nutrient.io/api/ios/documentation/instant/instantviewcontroller) on iOS , real-time syncing of annotations is fully automatic: Instant will push local changes to the server as they happen and listen for changes from the server.
 an [`InstantPdfFragment`](https://www.nutrient.io/api/android/nutrient/com.pspdfkit.instant.ui/-instant-pdf-fragment/index.html) on Android and an [`InstantViewController`](https://www.nutrient.io/api/ios/documentation/instant/instantviewcontroller) on iOS , you can enable listening for changes using.

Instant uses the network efficiently by coalescing changes with a one-second delay. You can reduce energy consumption at the cost of less immediate syncing by using `Nutrient.setDelayForSyncingLocalChanges` to increase the delay.

 , you can disable listening by using   `Nutrient.setListenToServerChanges(false)`. Then, sync manually whenever you want to by calling  `Nutrient.syncAnnotations()`.

## Disabling syncing after local changes

In addition to disabling listening for changes from the server (see above), you can disable syncing after local changes are made by   calling `Nutrient.setDelayForSyncingLocalChanges()`. This means that Instant will never sync annotations with the server unless your app requests this by calling  `Nutrient.syncAnnotations()`.

It’s possible to configure Instant to not sync after local changes are made but to listen for changes. However, this combination makes little sense and isn’t recommended, as the local changes would be pushed at seemingly random times when changes are received from the server.
---

## Related pages

- [Client authentication in PSPDFKit Instant](/guides/react-native/instant-synchronization/authentication.md)
- [Adding Instant comments to PDFs in React Native](/guides/react-native/instant-synchronization/comments.md)
- [PDF collaboration library for React Native](/guides/react-native/instant-synchronization.md)
- [Integrating real-time collaboration into your React Native application](/guides/react-native/instant-synchronization/get-started.md)
- [Instant sync and document state in React Native](/guides/react-native/instant-synchronization/document-state.md)
- [Create and manage PDF annotation layers in React Native](/guides/react-native/instant-synchronization/instant-layers.md)
- [Offline PDF annotations with sync on React Native](/guides/react-native/instant-synchronization/offline-support.md)
- [Nutrient Instant usage on React Native](/guides/react-native/instant-synchronization/usage.md)