InDesign Interactive PDF form fields not showing

Forum|Forum|1 year ago
March 26, 2025
3 replies
257 views

This is a bit of a wierd one and hard to explain, but I'm going to try.

I've designed a simple form in InDesign for a client. After testing it, everything looked okay, but the client came back telling me it didn't show the fields.

After some serious testing trying to recreate the problem, it turns out that it only works 100% of the time when I first open Acrobat before opening the actual file. When Acrobat isn't active yet when clicking the file in Finder to open it, it doesn't show part of the fields and radio buttons. Which one are shown or not is fully random.

It also doesn't matter wether fields or buttons are filled in or not. The info is all there, it just doesn't show untill you click it.

I hope it's all clear and someone has a solution for this...

Regards, Ralf

Bug

Abhishek Rao

Community Manager

Hi @RalfvanStijl,

As the expert said, it could be related to how Acrobat initializes form field rendering.

Could you post this issue in the Acrobat Community here: Acrobat - Adobe Community and get this checked with them?

If possible, could you share a screen recording showing the issue? If this is only with a specific file and not confidential, could you share the InDesign file and the respective PDF for testing? Also, confirm the InDesign version and machine, operating system details with it.

Thanks,

Abhishek

BobLevine

Community Expert

Doesn't sound like an InDesign issue to me. Try the Acrobat forum and post screenshots what "didn't show the fields" looks and acts like.

kglad

Community Expert

in the future, to find the best place to post your message, use the list here, https://community.adobe.com/

p.s. i don't think the adobe website, and forums in particular, are easy to navigate, so don't spend a lot of time searching that forum list. do your best and we'll move the post (like this one has already been moved) if it helps you get responses.

<"moved from using the community bugs">

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