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Acrobat for Windows and Mac: User Interface

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Ditch the 2023 User Interface in Acrobat

There are so many shortcomings and problems with the new 2023 GUI interface. Here are just a few:

  1. Swapping left and right-hand panels for no reason. This does not improve anything for users. It just forces users to change everything about how they work in Acrobat every workday.

  2. Functions are indicated by random icons. In the 90s, we learned that icons in software and websites don't work across different populations. Users have a difficult time figuring out what the heck they mean. Give text labels.

  3. The left panel is permanently positioned on the screen and obscures part of the document below. Seriously Adobe, WTF.

  4. The entire menu/panel system can't be customized, moved, or docked. Another WTF.

  5. Hamburger menus (those obscure 3 horizontal lines) are used on mobile interfaces to collapse menus. They are totally unnecessary and inappropriate on desktop interfaces — where working people spend most of their time working. Give people real menus with real names. "Menu" is not accurate, either. What is the name of the other menu to the right? Menu 2? Cheeseburger Menu?

  6. The new interface is inaccessible for those with disabilities who use assistive technologies, especially screen reader users. Adobe has seriously violated its VPAT with governments and corporations worldwide who are required by law to provide accessible work environments and tools.

  7. Grey on Grey is not an accessible color scheme. Can't tell if some icons are active or disabled. Those with low vision can't discern the icons.

  8. Digital signatures, Document Cloud (where Adobe stores your files by default), subscriptions, OCR, file creation, file combining, and accessibility all have reported major problems for the past few years...but rather than fix these critical problems, money was instead spent on rearranging the deck chairs on the sinking Titanic.

As long-time PDF consultants, my firm has found that the majority of customers are professionals who use Acrobat for their jobs. These are not "casual" users working on their smartphones. They are using desktops/laptops with full screens, not mobile devices to do their jobs. And they work with PDFs a lot.

They have developed actions and scripts to automate processes on dozens, hundreds, and even thousands of PDF files every day. These industries include print, prepress, graphic design, accessibility & remediation, accessible forms, variable forms, variable printing, data validation, financial institutions (think of all those bank statements every month!), health care, investment and finance, and manufacturing.

Dramatic GUI changes like 2023's completely change how these automated processes work...if they still work at all.

The cost to these industries to correct the now-broken processes — brought on by Adobe's whimsical, untested design idea — is appalling. If I was a major corporation hit by this unnecessary expense, I'd ban Adobe products from my company and look for another PDF vendor.

There are now many reputable competitors to Adobe Acrobat: See:
— https://www.tomsguide.com/best-picks/best-pdf-editors
— https://www.techradar.com/best/pdf-editors
— https://www.pcworld.com/article/407214/best-pdf-editors.html

Calling this Acrobat's "Modern Viewer" is a form of gaslighting Adobe customers. It's not modern at all — 30 years ago, using icons failed in software and web interfaces, and it's failing again with Acrobat 2023. Sometimes retro isn't good, especially retro user interfaces. Please don't attempt to bring back disco, old-fashioned 20 inch TVs, polyester suits, rotary phones and VHS tapes as being "Modern," too.

Ditch this "Modern Viewer" and instead give us a working tool to get our jobs done.

  1. Revert the interface back to what it was.

  2. Fix Acrobat's bugs. There are so many!

  3. And improve the accessibility for those with disabilities (who can't get to the Comments panel, Bookmarks panel, understand what and how much is redacted, make edits or change the content, scale/enlarge the interface, nor sign a PDF).

For those still reading this, users can revert to the old interface for now (August 2023).
— Windows: Hamburger Menu / Disable New Acrobat
— Mac: View Menu / Disable New Acrobat

I have no idea who long Adobe is going to let us revert to the "real" interface.

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Bevi Chagnon | PubCom.com shared this idea  ·   ·  Report…  ·  Admin →

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  • D Park commented  ·   ·  Report

    Thank goodness there's a way back to the old acrobat. Adobe is getting to be like microsoft. Making changes that make it harder to use a software program.

  • Robin Pruett commented  ·   ·  Report

    This is horrible!! Please revert back to the classic Adobe.

  • Gustavo Sánchez Muñoz commented  ·   ·  Report

    Please, please, please. Revert to the classic position of menus and commands in Acrobat. The change is no good, it serves no purpose and it does not make easier to work with Acrobat; much on the opposite.

    Thanks

  • Dan Price commented  ·   ·  Report

    Software should never make a forced change. Always have the option to remain "normal". Windows is the worst at this.

  • Domonkos Kiss (dkayjaykay) commented  ·   ·  Report

    I don't mind changes, but this one annoys me a lot on a daily basis and I can't get used to the change.
    Do you want to quickly rotate a page? Can't do it, you need to go through a pop-up screen first.
    If I want to rotate more than one page, then I just go the Organizer. How I supposed to know what pages I want to change from a pop-up window which blocks the view of the documents?
    I had a perfect tool bar set up previously, which I can't recreate in the new one.
    Sorry Adobe, but this update is an F minus

  • Ward Mahowald commented  ·   ·  Report

    Who's stupid idea was this new UI? Been using Acrobat for years, now every time I try to do something, it takes me 10 minutes of seaching Google and watching YouTube videos to do what used to be easy.

    I tried to bite the bullet and tell myself "if I just use it for a while, i'll get used to it". Wrong! After months of torturing myself with this dumb experiment, I switched back to the old UI.

  • Kat commented  ·   ·  Report

    I have to review multiple (5-15) pdfs daily for my job.
    My workflow requires being able to see BOTH thumbnails and comments at the same time. The new Acrobat combines these into the same menu so you have to choose one or the other! I mean, who thought that was a good idea?!

  • Ting You commented  ·   ·  Report

    The motivation for the redesign is to put the "subscription required" stuff in our face, like putting the milk in the back of the grocery store. Before, Adobe Reader was friendly and free, now it's almost impossible to see what requires a subscription and what doesn't.

    I'm guessing Adobe already has numbers on how many clicks on "subscription only" features lead to subscriptions (it's simple metrics). If that's working for them, we free users may just be SOL. In the end, it makes sense (no free lunch). I can't tell enough people I know about the revert feature. It's like opting out of spam.

  • P commented  ·   ·  Report

    I totally agree with everything Bevi Chagnon says in their feedback. The new interface is confusing and does nothing to help me use your product. The interface is just different without being better - it's worse in fact and a dumb marketing ploy that annoys most existing users. Focus instead on making your existing features better - like conversion to the Microsoft products.

  • Linda Decker commented  ·   ·  Report

    Why change the UI? It worked great in the previous mode and the new version stinks! I hate that the toolbar is locked to the window and can't be moved to the top menu bar. Also hate that that Bookmark bar is on the right - readers statistically read left to right and having the bookmark bar on the right is counter-intuitive to users! Get rid of the new UI and quit trying to fix what isn't broken!

  • Michael Twu commented  ·   ·  Report

    I agree 100%. The new New UI is terrible. Why would a company fix something that was not broken is beyond me. I also vote that the changes get reverted.

  • InstyButte Typesetting2 commented  ·   ·  Report

    A coworker tried the new interface today, and was unable to even use the program because of feature trial popups and interminably long spinning wheel shenanigans, during which time the program would not respond to any input. So, he didn't even get to experience the interface. After waiting about 10 minutes, Acrobat Pro crashed to desktop. I guess that's progress?

  • Gopa Campbell commented  ·   ·  Report

    I appreciate the comments below by Bevi Chagnon and John Kelman, but I wonder how much they will care if I say I am going to jump ship. I can't use a design program other than Indesign as the publishers I work for wouldn't have it, and as I pay for Acrobat as part of my subscription whether I use it or not, will they care what I think about the program? I wish they did care, but I have heard they are much more intersted in "the masses" than the professionals.

  • Bevi Chagnon | PubCom.com commented  ·   ·  Report

    @John Kelman, I don't believe the actual heads of programming have much to do with this interface design. My educated guess is that it was dumped on them by management or the marketing department.

    Probably best to go right to the top of Adobe, which is the senior managdement team listed on their investors part of the website. They are installed by the owners (no longer Chuck Geschke and John Warnock) but instead private equity investors (that should give you a clue!!!).

    See https://www.adobe.com/about-adobe/leaders.html.
    More info can be derived from Adobe's SEC reports to the US federal government and its public investors at https://www.adobe.com/investor-relations/financial-documents.html

    The actual "Senior Product Manager, Acrobat" is a nice guy who is probably caught between a rock and a hard place...and wanting to keep is paycheck.

  • John Kelman commented  ·   ·  Report

    I've tried searching the web for the "Senior Product Manager, Acrobat" or similar, to find an/the individual within Adobe who has both the responsibility to listen to customers, and the authority to prevent these ridiculous changes being implemented permanently. So far without success.
    If anyone can identify the appropriate person within Adobe, I think a concerted campaign of (firm, but polite and respectful, please) emails could be another effective way of drawing Adobe's attention to the commercial catastrophe that awaits them if this proposed "new" interface is implemented permanently.
    If anyone knows the correct person within Adobe to receive such emails, could they publish that person's email address on this forum?
    And I stress again, PLEASE do not insult or abuse this person - that will sink any chances we might have of being heard. I know emotions are running high, but clear, short, precise emails expressing the problems we've found with the new release are what is needed. Stress the number of license-paying users we represent and the volume of commercial work being done with Acrobat that would move away from Adobe if something doesn't change.

  • Kristine Griba commented  ·   ·  Report

    @ Martin: Imma gonna go out on a limb and suggest that we 550 users are the collective "voice in the wilderness" sadly :( Here's hoping I'm wrong.

  • Martin commented  ·   ·  Report

    Hi, I have already posted on this thread expressing a bug and loss of functionality in both versions of the GUI. Now a question occurred to me. Are we just a negligible fraction, subscribed users of Adobe Acrobat Pro who either do not like the new interface or struggle due to the loss of functionality? I mean, there must be millions of subscribers globally and here we are just like barely 550 users. And yet, there have been ideas with 12 votes accepted and implemented. I write this out of a concern that we might be stuck with this GUI as nobody knows when comes the time that they disable the "Switch to the old GUI" option. How many users is enough to make a change? Could somebody chip in their experience, please?

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