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Yigal_Levi
Participant
Nov 13, 2025 10:30 AM UTC
Answered

Indesign 2026 does not open PDF or illustrator files

I updated indesign to the latest version and though i read it can open pdf & Illustrator files - It does not do it.
PDF's and illustrtor are gryed out.

Is this features available only in the US?

It happened in earlyer versions of the app...
Yigal

BobLevine
BobLevineCorrect answer
Community Expert
Nov 13, 2025 8:20 PM UTC

Did you uninstall InDesign and then reinstall using an English version? AFAIK, that's the only way to get this feature. It does not come with the MENA or CJK versions.

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9 replies

BobLevine
Community Expert
BobLevineCommunity Expert
Community Expert
Nov 13, 2025 12:16 PM UTC

Are you using an English language version of InDesign 2026? It will work in all but CJK and MENA versions so I suspect you're using one of those.

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Yigal_LeviAuthor
Participant
Nov 13, 2025 7:47 PM UTC

I use Indesign with midle east language support (Hebrew).
I even tried to switch to English - and relaunched indesign - It did not solve the problem.
I do not have the command Open PDF and trying to open a pdf file via open fails...

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BobLevine
Community Expert
BobLevineCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
Community Expert
Nov 13, 2025 8:20 PM UTC

Did you uninstall InDesign and then reinstall using an English version? AFAIK, that's the only way to get this feature. It does not come with the MENA or CJK versions.

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Gord@APL
Gord@APL
Inspiring
Nov 13, 2025 11:13 AM UTC

Can confirm that this feature is not geographically limited - I'm in the UK, and it's working in version 21.0.

 

File > Open PDF... also works with .ai files though, to be fair, I'm mostly saving those as PDF compatible.

 

Not entirely convinced of this feature's usefulness, though - where a bitmap has been broken up into sections, the conversion to InDesign creates large gaps where the image section doesn't fill its picture box. It's like that long-complained-about visual glitch in Acrobat, writ large.

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Yigal_LeviAuthor
Participant
Nov 13, 2025 11:23 AM UTC

I do not have Open PDF in my menu...

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Willi Adelberger
Community Expert
Willi AdelbergerCommunity Expert
Community Expert
Nov 13, 2025 10:39 AM UTC

You should not open PDFs and AI files. Place them

into InDesign 

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Yigal_LeviAuthor
Participant
Nov 13, 2025 11:12 AM UTC

I already know that, But if Indesign has a new feture that can open pdf files - I may need that oneday....
It does not open pdf files - so i need to know why this feature does not work.

 

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