General preferences

Basic Tools

• Use Single Key Accelerators To Access Tools: Enables you to select tools with a single keystroke. This option is deselected by default.
• Create Links From URLs: Specifies whether links that weren’t created with Acrobat are automatically identified in the PDF document and become clickable links.
  
• Make Hand Tool Select Text & Images: Enables the Hand tool to function as the Select tool when it hovers over text in an Adobe PDF.
  
• Make Hand Tool Read Articles: Changes the appearance of the Hand tool pointer when over an article thread. Upon the first click, the article zooms to fill the document pane horizontally; subsequent clicks follow the thread of the article.
  
• Make Hand Tool Use Mouse-wheel Zooming: Changes the action of the mouse wheel from scrolling to zooming.
  
• Make Select Tool Select Images Before Text: Changes the order in which the Select tool selects.
• Show Quick actions on text selection: Display a quick action toolbar on text or image selection.
  
• Show Online Storage When Opening Files: Display the cloud storage in the file open dialog box.
• Show Online Storage When Saving Files: Display the cloud storage while saving the file.
• Open PDFs from last session on Acrobat launch: Reopen PDFs from the last session on launching Acrobat.
  
• Open Documents As New Tabs In The Same Window (requires relaunch): Groups multiple documents into tabs when opened. You can also snap or pull out tabs as individual windows. Select a tab and drag the thumbnail that appears away from the toolbar, and then release the tab. 
  
• Prompt Before Closing Multiple Tabs: Confirms from the user before closing Acrobat.
• Show Starred Files In Recent Tab: Displays the starred files as cards in Home view.
  
• Use Fixed Resolution For Snapshot Tool Images: Sets the resolution used to copy an image captured with the Snapshot tool.
• Enable PDF thumbnail preview in Windows Explorer: Select to display PDFs as thumbnail preview in Windows Explorer.
  
• Touch Mode: Sets how Acrobat enters the Touch mode, if at all, for touch enabled devices. In Touch mode, Toolbar buttons, panels, and menus shift apart slightly to accommodate selecting with your fingers. The Touch reading mode optimizes viewing and supports most common gestures.
• Scale for screen resolution (restart required): Auto-detect screen resolution and scale the PDF for viewing, or display the PDF as it is irrespective of the screen resolution.
  

Warnings

• Do Not Show Edit Warnings: Disables warning boxes that would normally appear when you delete items such as links, pages, page thumbnails, and bookmarks.
• Reset All Warnings: Restores default settings for warnings.

Messages From Adobe

• Show Me Messages When I Launch Acrobat: Allows in-product marketing messages from Adobe to appear in the Welcome Screen when you launch the application without a document open. Click a message to get information about features, updates, or online services, or to open an element in the application, such as a task pane. Deselect the option to prevent in-product marketing messages from appearing. 

Application Startup

• Use Only Certified Plug-Ins: Ensures that only Adobe-certified third-party plug-ins are loaded. The notation Currently in Certified Mode indicates either Yes or No depending on its status.
• Check 2D Graphics Accelerator (Windows only): (Appears only if your computer hardware supports 2D graphics acceleration.) When selected, allows hardware acceleration usage when the first document is opened. When deselected, hardware acceleration usage starts after the first document is opened. This option can slow startup time, so it is deselected by default.
  

• Select As Default PDF Handler (Windows only): This setting specifies which application, Reader or Acrobat, is used to open PDFs. It applies if you have both Acrobat and Reader installed on your computer.
• Tell Me If Adobe Acrobat Is Not My Default PDF Application (Windows only): If Acrobat isn't set as the default PDF handler, a dialog prompts whether to make Adobe Acrobat the default PDF application whenever you launch Acrobat.
  

Page Display preferences

Default Layout And Zoom

• Page Layout: Sets the page layout used for scrolling when you first open a document. The default setting is Automatic. The Page Layout setting in File > Properties > Initial View overrides this value.
• Zoom: Sets the magnification level for PDF documents when they are first opened. The default setting is Automatic. The Magnification setting in File > Properties > Initial View overrides this value.
  

Resolution

• Use System Setting: Uses the system settings for monitor resolution.
• Custom Resolution: Sets the monitor resolution.
  

Rendering

• Smooth Text: Specifies the type of text-smoothing to apply.
• Smooth Line Art: Applies smoothing to remove abrupt angles in lines.
  
• Smooth Images: Applies smoothing to minimize abrupt changes in images.
  
• Use Local Fonts: Specifies whether the application uses or ignores local fonts installed on your system. When deselected, substitute fonts are used for any font not embedded in the PDF. If a font cannot be substituted, the text appears as bullets, and an error message appears.
  
• Enhance Thin Lines: When selected, clarifies thin lines in the display to make them more visible.
  
• Use Page Cache: Places the next page in a buffer before the current page is viewed to reduce the time required to page through a document.
  
• Use 2D Graphics Acceleration (Windows only): (Appears only if your computer hardware supports 2D graphics acceleration.) Speeds up zooming, scrolling, and redrawing of page content, and speeds the rendering and manipulation of 2D PDF content. This option is selected by default.  
  

Page Content And Information

• Show Large Images: Displays large images. If your system is slow to display image-intensive pages, deselect this option.
• Use Smooth Zooming (Windows only): When deselected, turns off animation effects, which improves performance.
  
• Show Art, Trim, & Bleed Boxes: Displays any art, trim, or bleed boxes defined for a document.
  
• Show Transparency Grid: Displays the grid behind transparent objects.
  
• Use Logical Page Numbers: Enables the Number Pages command for matching the position of the page in the PDF to the number printed on the page. A page number, followed by the page position in parentheses, appears in the Page Navigation toolbar and in the Go To Page and Print dialog boxes. For example, i (1 of 1) if the printed number of the first page is i. If this option is not selected, pages are numbered with Arabic numbers starting at 1. Selecting this option helps prevent unexpected behavior when clicking Back or Go Back in your web browser.
  
• Always Show Document Page Size: Displays the page measurements beside the horizontal scroll bar.
  
• Use Overprint Preview: Specifies whether Overprint Preview mode is on only for PDF/X files, never on, always on, or set automatically. When set to Automatic, if a document contains overprints, then Overprint Preview mode is activated. The Overprint Preview mode lets you see (onscreen) the effects of ink aliasing in the printed output. For example, a printer or service provider could create an ink alias if a document contains two similar spot colors and only one is required.
  
• Default Transparency Blending Color Space: Sets the default color space, Working RGB or Working CMYK, for transparency blending.
  

Reference XObjects View Mode

• Show Reference XObject Targets: Specifies the type of documents in which reference XObjects can be viewed.
• Location Of Referenced Files (Optional): Specifies a location for the referenced documents.
  

Touch mode for tablet and mobile devices

Touch mode makes it easier to use Acrobat and Acrobat Reader on touch devices. Toolbar buttons, panels, and menus shift apart slightly to accommodate selecting with your fingers. The Touch reading mode optimizes viewing and supports most common gestures. Acrobat and Acrobat Reader automatically switch to Touch mode when on a touch-enabled device. You can change the default preference setting for Touch mode.

Change Touch Mode preference

Change the PDF/A viewing mode

PDF/A is an ISO standard for long-term archiving and preservation of electronic documents. Documents you scan to PDF are PDF/A-compliant. You can specify whether you want to view documents in this viewing mode.

When you open a PDF/A compliant document in PDF/A viewing mode, the document is opened in Read mode to prevent modification. A message is displayed in the document message bar. You will be unable to make changes and add annotations to the document. If you turn off PDF/A mode, you can edit the document.

Display PDFs in Line Weights view

The Line Weights view displays lines with the weights defined in the PDF. When Line Weights view is off, it applies a constant stroke width (one pixel) to lines, regardless of zoom. When you print the document, the stroke prints at the true width.

Show or hide toolbar items, side panels, grids, and cursor coordinates

While viewing a PDF, you can use View > Show/Hide to display the following elements in Acrobat:

• Menu Bar: (macOS) To show or hide the menu bar, select View > Show/Hide > Menu Bar. You can also use the keyboard shortcut Shift + Command + M.
• Customize toolbar: You can change the tools that appear on the Quick Action toolbar. For more information, view Customize quick action toolbar. 
  • (Windows) Select the hamburger menu from the upper left and then select View > Show/Hide > Customize toolbar.
  • (macOS) Select View > Show/Hide  > Customize toolbar.

• Side panels:  Side panels are vertical panes displayed on either side when you open a document in Acrobat. Learn more about Customize side panels.
  •  (Windows) Select the hamburger menu from the upper left and then select View > Show/Hide > Side panels.
  • (macOS) Select  View > Show/Hide > Side panels.

• Rulers & Grids: Use grids to accurately line up text and objects in a document. To view or hide the grid:
  • (Windows) Select the hamburger menu from the upper left and then select View > Show/Hide > Rulers & Grids > Grid.
  • (macOS) Select View >  Show/Hide > Rulers & Grids > Grid.

A check mark appears next to the command name when the grid is displayed. For more information, view PDFs of Grids, guides, and measurements. 

• Cursor Coordinates: The Cursor Coordinates show the coordinate position of the pointer within the document pane. To view x and y coordinates:
  • (Windows) Select the hamburger menu from the upper left. Select View > Show/Hide > Cursor Coordinates.
  •  (macOS) Select View > Show/Hide > Cursor Coordinates.

Learn more about how to View Cursor Coordinates.

Compare a revised PDF to an earlier version (Acrobat Pro)

Use the Compare Files feature to show the differences between two versions of a PDF. You can customize many options for displaying the compare results. For more information, see Compare two versions of a PDF file.