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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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  • AR commented  ·   ·  Report

    Oh well, I am on a Mac.

  • David Peters commented  ·   ·  Report

    Yes, unfortunately you will not be able to use the world's best PDF editor if you are stuck on a Mac.

  • Leo commented  ·   ·  Report

    > Hmm... I shall add that the company is located in Chemainus, British Columbia

    The product is Windows-only.

  • David Peters commented  ·   ·  Report

    Hmm... I shall add that the company is located in Chemainus, British Columbia 💁🏼‍♂️

  • AR commented  ·   ·  Report

    @David Peters - Can you tell us the name of the Canadian PDF Editor or is that not allowed?

  • David Peters commented  ·   ·  Report

    We can forget that Adobe will be listening to its users, and that things might change one day again for the better. It's too late, no one from the original team that once made Acrobat great is still with them.

    Management is obviously imbecile, product managers and UI designers are morons, as everyone can see by looking at this software.

    Adobe has been following this aberration for almost a decade now, there is no turning back anymore. https://community.adobe.com/t5/acrobat-discussions/acrobat-dc-so-horrible-it-s-making-me-want-to-cry/m-p/7112345

    It is time for everyone to move on.

    There is, for example, a company in Canada that has been making the best PDF editor in the world for decades, that is light years ahead in terms of speed, features, ease of use and user interface. And costs about one fifth of Adobe Acrobat "𝗗isastrous 𝗖rap" Plonkfessional. Playdoughial. Faux-passional.

  • Anonymous Professional User (since 2018) commented  ·   ·  Report

    Like you, my normal workflow, the one I've been using since 2016, is to have Acrobat open on one side of my screen and a different window open for reference on the other, viewing both simultaneously to transfer information. This new user interface, with its *gigantic*, fixed-size, and immovable sidebar, makes that impossible.

    The new UI is so wholly incompatible with how I use Acrobat that I uninstalled it today (hoping to "downgrade" to the more-functional previous version) before reading this post.

    I'll try this. II *really* hope it works.

    I'm a desktop user. I need the original interface. Most desktop users do. Removing/disabling it will have me switching to a competitor. I hope Adobe listens, but I'm really not sure at this point.

    OP, thank you very much for offering a workaround to Adobe's mistake.

  • Development commented  ·   ·  Report

    I understand updating interfaces sometimes can be helpful but this one is NOT more helpful. The toolbar, even though it apparently has been updated to be "draggable", still covers my document that I'm trying to read, no matter where I drag it. Please have this toolbar OFF of the document.

  • Jiminy Crickets commented  ·   ·  Report

    OP worded this beautifully and captured my feelings. Whatever moron approved these GUI changes needs to be removed from all oversight at Adobe.

  • Richard Craven commented  ·   ·  Report

    This is a terrible change. I spend from 2 to 3 hours total each working day reading 1,000+ page IBM mainframe manuals. I have an extensive library of these in PDF form to assist me in system programming and maintenance work. It's important for me to have a streamlined commenting feature so that I can mark and reach frequently-referenced areas quickly. It's important to me to have a compressed contents abstract because the fewer 'next-page' operations required, the faster I can find my needed topic. My library of 350+ PDFs is suddenly much less useful because of this change.

  • Philip Taylor commented  ·   ·  Report

    Bill — Assuming that you are using Microsoft Windows, "Acrobat /N" in the Start / Search programs and files dialogue box" will open a new instance of Adobe Acrobat DC.

  • Bill Dunne commented  ·   ·  Report

    I'm sure it's been called out in addition to this list, but removing the ability to have Adobe PDF's open in multiple individual windows is callous. Not just for the obvious need to have two different PDF's open on two different screens, but you've also made it significantly more difficult to use hot-keys (alt+tab) to jump around documents.

  • Kristin N commented  ·   ·  Report

    The new App crashes/freezes without fail multiple times a day on Sonoma. No words for the "Modern" UI. Gobsmacked by awfulness...

  • David Peters commented  ·   ·  Report

    Everybody realize how even the support has given up on this thread that has hundreds of voices and thousands of views?

    And it's the same with countless similar threads about the abysmal UI and dreadful performance of Acrobat:

    https://bit.ly/Acrobat-Uservoice-Interface
    (that's a short link to the corresponding search result in this forum)

    This also happened almost a decade ago, when the unstoppable, dreadful demise of Adobe Acrobat began with the introduction of the Adobe "𝗗𝗶𝘀𝗺𝗮𝗹 𝗖𝗿𝗮𝗽" DC version:
    https://community.adobe.com/t5/acrobat-discussions/acrobat-dc-so-horrible-it-s-making-me-want-to-cry/m-p/7112345/page/4

  • Richard J commented  ·   ·  Report

    Adobe: Please never never NEVER remove the Disable New Acrobat option.

    I cannot overstate how awful I find the new interface. Everything I need to do takes twice as long. I have worked very happily for years with the classic interface but it's now so clunky. I especially lament the removal of the original right hand sidebar with all the tools - everything I need in one place, and you could customise the tool panels too.

    Seriously, what were you thinking???

  • Way Chun commented  ·   ·  Report

    The new UI causes the app to freeze often.

  • JD commented  ·   ·  Report

    Why the change to the basic layout with this "new" version? Specifically, transposing the side panels. The change does not serve any USEFUL purpose whatsoever. It seems to have been done so that we know it's been updated. If the improvements to functionality don't speak for themselves, then changing the layout for the sake of change is insulting to your users.

    Let's be clear, this is not a matter of "we're just not used to it yet". There's a practical, functional, reason to have bookmarks on the left. Bookmarks work as a TOC which is crucial to navigating large documents. To have to use the right panel when navigating through a document via the table of contents is counterintuitive, inefficient, and makes navigating large documents very difficult.

    The least you could do is let users change the layout in preferences. Making this a default layout is remarkably short sided.

  • David Peters commented  ·   ·  Report

    Exactly Richard. In this universe, things will continue to only get worse with Adobe Acrobat, as they have for almost a decade now.

    Everyone, don't waste your time trying to get heard here.

    It's over, people. Move on.

  • Richard Roland commented  ·   ·  Report

    I have bad news for the many folks who have posted here about how wonderful it is to be able to revert back: Corporations do not EVER leave such measures in place permanently. It's just a matter of time until you will be forced to live with the unbearable new UI or look for another product. The time for searching for a replacement is now.

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