Problem Exporting a PDF

Hi ​@Friendly_grace4b88,

We would like to follow up regarding your reporting issue. Have you been able to resolve it by implementing the recommendations provided by our experts? Please inform us of what works for you, or let us know if the issue persists and provide the requested information for further assistance.

Please also take a look at this article and attempt the suggested steps.

Let us know if that proves helpful. We will do our utmost to assist you.

Thanks,

Harshika

Since the PDF export is failing even when you try a few artboards at a time, I’d first check whether the issue is caused by a particular image or a complex effect rather than just the overall file size.

Try saving a copy of the Illustrator file, then go to File > Save a Copy > Adobe PDF. In the PDF settings, uncheck Preserve Illustrator Editing Capabilities, as this can significantly reduce the file size.

If it still fails, try these steps:

1. Check for oversized or embedded images. Resize and optimize them in Photoshop before placing them in Illustrator.

2. Try copying one artboard into a new Illustrator document and saving it as a PDF. This may help identify a problematic image or object.

3. Check whether complex clipping masks, transparency effects, or raster effects are causing the export to fail.

4. Try saving the file locally rather than to a cloud-synced folder.

Also, does Illustrator show a specific error message when the PDF export fails, or does it simply freeze or crash? Knowing that, along with your Illustrator version, would help narrow down the cause.

Are you sending a PDF copy of the document to a company to get certain kinds of print work done? If so, it would probably be best to talk to them on the phone about specific document settings and PDF export settings, particularly if they expect to simply be able to drop the file into a print queue and output it. Depending on the situation you may have to export each artboard as a separate PDF file.

I would also use a strong bit of caution if ramping up compression levels or down-rezzing resolution of images to reduce file size. Those changes will affect print quality. The quality hit can be really visible in large format printed output. If the PDF file(s) can be saved without the Preserve Illustrator Editing Capability setting checked that will reduce the file size quite a bit.

​@Friendly_grace4b88 when you save your PDF, you can save as a PDF with the artboards selected:
 

Select the smallest file size preset
 

And you can also change the compression even further, but, your images quality will also go down too​​​​​​​

Also, if you open the file in Acrobat, you can even reduce the PDF further. 
 

Just how large are the images?

Have you considered optimizing the images in Photohop before placing them in Illustrator? If you have a huge image and then scale it down to the size of a stamp and then maybe apply a clipping mask and add some effects over it, Illustrator will have a pretty hard time exporting that.

Also: which PDF settings? 

​@Friendly_grace4b88 What settings do you use when saving as PDF? By default Illustrator saves the .ai file with PDF compatibility, so it already saves a PDF. Did you turn that option off?