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caitlin_9092
Participant
August 31, 2025
Question

Captivate keeps crashing

  • August 31, 2025
  • 3 replies
  • 318 views

I'm a creative cloud user and just downloaded the captivate free trial. It keeps freezing and crashing and is unusable. I have a brand new Mac that is updated and says it's compatible. 

 

i tried every suggestion I could find on these message boards and online. NOTHING is working. Even if I get it to open and begin working I can add one word to a slide and when I go to save it freezes my entire computer and I have to manually restart. 

 

i also found adobe support is practically non existent and their AI chat bot is worse than useless.

 

does anyone have a magic secret for getting captivate to function?  Please oh please I have spent my entire evening just trying to get this to work. 

      3 replies

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      phoenix_4740
      Participant
      September 22, 2025

      I was having the same issue, and I'm not sure exactly what solved it, but I was able to save just now. I am using the latest version of Captivate (downloaded 10/20) with Mac OS Sequoia 15.6.1.

       

      What I did was:

      • Created a new user on my computer, since I read somewhere that using iCloud to sync documents could cause issues. This didn't change anything initially, so I'm not sure if this step matters.
      • Downloaded Captivate Classic to test, and can save files on that just fine.
      • Tried again saving with the current Captivate, without making any changes to the blank presentation or choosing a different file location. It initially looked like it was going to fail again, but it actually did save.

       

      I am now able to make changes to the file and save them, and can quite Captivate and relaunch it by opening the saved file.

       

      Hopefully this helps? I really have no idea if this fixed it or if I just got lucky.

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      Adobe Employee
      pankaj_ku
      Adobe Employee
      September 2, 2025

      Which version of Captivate you are using? and which workflow it is crashing?

      Did you send crashes to Adobe?

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      caitlin_9092Author
      Participant
      September 2, 2025

      Captivate 9.0

       

      I sent the crashes to Adobe when it gave me the option.

       

      i have been unable to do anything with Captivate. The farthest I got was adding a title to a slide, then when I click save it either crashes, or the wheel spins eternally to the point I can't even force quit and have to restart my computer entirely. 

      Sometimes it's freezing and sometimes it's crashing. I found some possible solutions on message boards here but none of them made any difference so far. 

      RodWard
      Community Expert
      RodWardCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      September 3, 2025

      I'm afraid if your version of Captivate is that old (version 9.0) then no matter what you do it is unlikely to be compatible with your Mac.  Adobe has not released updates for that version for several years.

       

      If you upgrade to Captivate 11.8 then it is very similar to your version and should be compatible.

      RodWard
      Community Expert
      RodWardCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      September 1, 2025

      If you have a brand new Mac and the Operating System is updated to the very latest version, then THAT may be your problem.  Captivate has always been known to behave badly on Macs if the OS version is not one that Adobe has approved.

      Go to this page on the Adobe HELP site and check the approved Mac OS against the one you have:

      Adobe Captivate System Requirements for Windows and Mac

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      caitlin_9092Author
      Participant
      September 2, 2025

      Thank you so much for the response. I did check and I had Sequoia 15 which is listed on the link you sent. 

      I am baffled and customer service seems to be non-existent. I was really excited to try Captivate and I still haven't been able to even create one slide before it freezes and crashes. 

      RodWard
      Community Expert
      RodWardCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      September 2, 2025

      I am not a Mac user, so unfortunately I am not going to be able to help you resolve this issue.  Hopefully another Mac user will chime in with more suggestions.

       

      FYI: You are correct that Adobe's customer service model leaves a lot to be desired.  They seem to think that the unpaid user community is the only support they need to offer.  However, there are many issues that can only be resolved by Adobe techniciana with the necessary expertise.  When it comes to Captivate, Adobe doesn't seem to rate it as important enough to get that level of support.  This is a failing that must be costing the company millions of dollars in lost revenue and leaves them vulnerable to other competive apps.

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