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impressive_member8897
Participant
February 9, 2026
Question

How do I stop Adobe from opening previously viewed documents from the page where I last closed it? And how do I do so without causing other issues?

  • February 9, 2026
  • 2 replies
  • 30 views

Good morning,

 

So, I use Adobe for the multitude of PDF’s I get on the daily.  However (and I don’t know how many times this has caused me issues in the past or made me look foolish, as I have never noticed this before) when I went to view many of my previous doc’s one after another, towards the end (there were lots) I realised that Adobe was opening documents at the last place I was on when I closed it last, i.e. at the bottom.  Considering I was just scrolling down to see if a certain doc was present before closing them, I likely missed the one I wanted.  I personally think this is a terrible feature, but others may find it useful, so no judgements. 

However, to the point of the matter.  I searched how to turn this feature off, only to find that it was one I had to specifically turn on to stop another issue previously, (How do I stop Adobe from changing my view and page settings because of the settings used when the document being viewed was created?).  The issue with that is that I am sent PDF’s from others, and Adobe kept messing with my display to match what the creator had theirs set for, I don’t care how they like to do work, only how I like to do work.

 

So how do I stop Adobe from opening doc’s at where I happened to find the thing I was looking for last time?  And how do I do so without making it so Adobe makes decisions on its own about how I should view documents based on the original creators settings?

I use “Classic view”.

I have “Open PDFs from last session on Acrobat launch” turned off.

I have “Restore last view settings when reopening documents” turned on. (This one must stay “on” or my views get altered all the time which makes performing tasks agonising as I have to re-find all my tools.)

 

 

Regards,

    2 replies

    JR Boulay
    Community Expert
    JR BoulayCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    February 9, 2026

    Uncheck this option in the Preferences:

     

     

    Acrobate du PDF, InDesigner et Photoshopographe
    Amal.
    Community Manager
    Amal.Community Manager
    Community Manager
    February 9, 2026

    Hi there 

     

    Hope you are doing well and sorry for the trouble.


    Just to make sure I’m guiding you correctly, could you confirm a couple of things:

    • Which Acrobat app are you using (Acrobat Reader or Acrobat Pro/Standard)?
    • What’s your OS and version (Windows/macOS, and which version)?
    • Do you notice this behavior with all PDFs, or only with certain files (for example, ones received from others)?


    Right now, Acrobat is behaving as designed based on this setting: “Restore last view settings when reopening documents.”

    This option bundles a few behaviors together:

    • It remembers zoom, layout, tool panels, etc. (the part you want)
    • It also remembers the last scroll position / page (the part causing trouble)

    at the moment, there isn’t a separate toggle to remember tools and layout but ignore last scroll position. So you’re running into a limitation of how those preferences are grouped.

    You can try to use “Go to first page” before closing - a quick habit, without letting Acrobat override your view based on the sender’s settings

    Before closing a PDF, hit Home or Ctrl + Home (Windows) / Cmd + ↑ (macOS) to jump back to the top.

    This resets the “last position” Acrobat remembers, so when you reopen the file later, it won’t dump you at the bottom.

     

    Hope this will help.

     

    ~Amal

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