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victors29152714
New Participant
March 20, 2019
Answered

Can't select or copy text

  • March 20, 2019
  • 5 replies
  • 33068 views

Suddenly I am not able to select and copy any text from any PDF document, whether from a PDF I have created that contains renderable text, or from a scan that I have used text recognition on. All I get is a hand symbol. None of the documents are protected. It worked a few days ago! I use Windows 10, have Adobe Acrobat Standard 2015.

    Correct answer Bernd Alheit

    Activate the select tool and select the text.

    5 replies

    S
    Susan5C66
    New Participant
    August 10, 2025

    I found that if you go to: spam and upload the document it will converti it to plain text.  Ive been trying for an hour to figure this out also. This is the only thing I could find. 

    creative explorer
    creative explorer
    Community Expert
    August 11, 2025

    @Susan5C66 Adobe Acrobat can do this as well. While using an online tool may be quick and fast, but if it's sensitive information, well, they could share it with the world. Hence, why I love Adobe. They won't share it! When you open a scanned document or an image-based PDF in Adobe Acrobat, you can use the "Recognize Text" tool. The software's engine will analyze the image, identifying shapes that look like letters and numbers. After the analysis, it converts those shapes into actual, selectable text. This turns a static image of a page into a digital document where you can highlight, copy, and search for words. You can then save the file as a searchable PDF or export the text to a different format, like a plain text (.txt) file or a Microsoft Word (.docx) document.

    m
    V
    Victoria27144301pbg8
    New Participant
    February 8, 2023

    I have just done a remote session with an Adobe support specialist. there is a potential work-around where if you click at the beginning of the word you want to copy, then hold 'shift' and use the arrows to select the text you want. it is a bit of a long-winded solution, but it worked for me when my cursor was not selecting any of the text. Otherwise your Adobe Acrobat software may need to be 'repaired'. you can contact Adobe through the chat support function and they will put you through to a specialist for a remote session to repair the installed software - this solved the issue for me.

      F
      fredly
      New Participant
      March 28, 2025

      I have two better ideas:

       

      • What if Adobe released a new update to fix this MAJOR problem. This is huge problem for me, but I see absolutely NO REASON to contact an Adobe specialist to resolve a system wide issue as an individual one-off repair.
      • If Adobe won’t do that, we could cancel our subscriptions and use the FREE products offered elsewhere.
        G
        gmfct07
        New Participant
        December 5, 2021

        I am having a similar problem with the Adobe Acrobat DC app that I rent.  As usual the problem has arisen from out of the blue, with no clue as to what is causing it.  I am sick and tired to squandering time on problems that come out of nowhere, with no clue as to a solution.  My problem is that the cursor appears as a lengthy vertical line instead of the usual image.  So I cannot select a link, provided in a readable  Adobe / PDF document, that I wish to import to the search field in order to access a document cited in the original pdf document.

          V
          Victoria27144301pbg8
          New Participant
          February 8, 2023

          I am having the same problem. PDFs that I previously could select and copy text from I now don't appear to have any select option. The PDFs are not protected so I don't understand why. If I choose the 'edit pdf' option I can then 'select all' from a whole paragraph of text but I still can't just select a sentence or section. This appears to have happened when my Adobe Acrobat Pro was updated.

            rise.lu
            rise.lu
            Participating Frequently
            November 24, 2020

            Maybe the tool is available but not visible: you can try shortcuts, "h" is for hand tool, "v" is for the selection tool. 
            Shortcuts must be activated via edit / preferences/ general / use single-key shortcuts

              Bernd Alheit
              Bernd AlheitCorrect answer
              Community Expert
              March 21, 2019

              Activate the select tool and select the text.

              M
              marianav67924224
              New Participant
              November 30, 2022

              Unfortunately, this does not work. When I click on the select tool and want to select text, it makes a shape (blue rectangle) over the text, but it is not the same as when you select text anywhere else, normally. The "select tool" pictogram also shows a little rectangle next to the "arrow" (bottom right).   So ti looks like this, but then nothing happens.:

                Bernd Alheit
                Bernd Alheit
                Community Expert
                November 30, 2022

                This looks like a image without selectable text.

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