Adobe Acrobat Reader is *incredibly* slow & keeps hanging - AGAIN!!

[i fm34168167]

Since the release 24.003.20054, Adobe Reader is AGAIN running slow again opening documents

Does anyone know why Adobe Acrobat Reader is so *incredibly* slow & keeps hanging please?

I keep getting the 'not responding' message; have to close it down & try again.

Documents load *really* slowly, if at all!

I have a fast PC with 32 GB of memory, so that shouldn't be the problem...

The previous 'fix' at here no longer works !!

Any ideas on speeding it up please?

[gordian_0128]

we are also verifing that the same issue applies for version  24.003.20054

[default05vwr1kj0e74]

Same here with al lot of win 11 machines.

[incopy cs6]

Same issue here, for both 64 and 32 bit installers. Not responding on launch, can take a minute or longer of waiting for it to resolve itself. Engaging with window during this time can cause a full crash.

[raresolid]

I am having the same issue with this version as well on Windows 10 systems. (Adobe Acrobat 24.003.20054)

[marc_9025]

We also have the problem since the last 3-4 versions. The employees are already annoyed 😕

[Hector Manuel26002464vtln]

I am having the same issue from many weeks now. I have updated to the latest version and problem persists. 

Fixing the setup partially works sor some time. 

[i fm34168167]

STILL THERE IN RELEASE 24.003.20112!!!

[raresolid]

Can confirm that after updeate to 2024.003.20112 64-bit, the issue presists. After looking closer at it, it seems as thought it might have something to do with the free trial screen that pops up on the left hand side. As the software unfreezes once this comes up, which is strange to me. Hopfully this can be fixed soon.

[raresolid]

I may have discovered a way to solve this issue. I noticed that after opening up Adobe, it was showing 70 recent PDF files in history. I clicked the box to select all of the history items and then cleared them all out. I closed and reopened and now Adobe is no longer crashing and is working correctly again. Give this a try and see if it works for you. It worked for me.

[i fm34168167]

Doesn't work for me.

[raresolid]

Darn 😞 It is still working for me. Hopfully Adobe can address it sooner then later.

[jim_9622]

Worked for me - removed all the "freeze" for a few seconds and loaded like it used to , thanks. 🙂

[Dax37664194hktd]

Thank you! This has seemed to help me so far. Fingers crossed that will continue...

[defaultkedesh6bzplg]

Are there any updates?

[i fm34168167]

No

[dan_1202]

Disabeling protected mode at start up and enhanced security helps but it's just a bandaid. Has Adobe put out anything about this issue yet?

menu\prefrences\security enhanced\    uncheck enable protected mode & uncheck Enable Enhanced Security

[i fm34168167]

No

[Maxwell_66]

Is there a registry key to disable this protected mode setting?

[Generous_inspiration7319]

This worked for me.  1/27/2025

[Jonathan28648969ckx7]

We have the same issue in our organisation. Since some months the Adobe Acrobat Reader is very slow and keeps hanging every few seconds.

Especially at devices with just 8GB of RAM the performance is very poor.

We discovered that we're still using the 32-Bit version. The 64-Bit version is running a bit smoother, but still not as it should.

What is very interesting is that we use the same version of Adobe Acrobat Reader on our terminal server (Windows Server 2022), on which it runs perfectly. The configuration is besides the OS pretty much the same. So it's maybe a Windows 10/11-only problem?

[sergey_2127]

Have you attempted to sign into the app and then test it?

I encountered the same problem, but it seemed to work fine after signing in. 

[Jonathan28648969ckx7]

We have not tried this because only some of our users have an Adobe ID and a CC subscription. We assume that the tutorials, the “What's new” page etc. slow down the reader because they are partly loaded from the Internet and cannot pass through our proxy.

I partially managed to get Adobe Reader to work by setting some registry keys. I'll post an answer to the main thread for that.

[JenniferBB]

I have been signed in yet the problem persists.

[Jonathan28648969ckx7]

We set the following reg keys for Adobe Reader, just to be sure in both the "Acrobat Reader" and the "Adobe Acrobat" paths (because they changed something there a few months ago):

In

HKCU\Software\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\DC\AVGeneral

HKCU\Software\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\DC\AVGeneral

We set the following reg keys, all DWord:

bExpandRHPInViewer  = 0

bHasUserChangedRHPStickyState = 1

bRHPSticky = 1

In

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\DC\FeatureLockDown

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\DC\FeatureLockDown

We set the following reg key, also DWord:

bUsageMeasurement = 0

After that, Adobe Reader will behave normally again when we open PDF files and browse through them. Probably only bUsageMeasurement is needed, but in case not, at least the other keys are documented here.

Adobe Reader still hangs when we open the start page (probably because it tries to load thumbnails for the recently opened documents). Does anyone know, if there's a reg key to disable the loading of the thumbnails, by the way?

And when we use the comment function for the first time, Adobe Reader hangs. But since it only happens the first time, it's probably because a tutorial is trying to load or something.

Of course, this is all just a workaround, and Adobe should fix the problem soon so that it works again without custom configurations.