PDF fillable form not displaying field data

[T_Hubbard]

Greetings, 

I have an employee who is receiving fillable PDF forms for work via email. When opening file preview on the form within Outlook Desktop the form is displayed and the field data is in the fields designated. When opening the PDF with Reader or Acrobat Pro the forms field data is blank. Clicking on fields to highlight test does not reveal anything, and trying to insert a space and delete the space within the field nothing is revealed. When opening the file with MS Edge, all the forms field data is then viewable. I have another employee that was able to open the same form using their Acrobat XI and was able to view the field data as well. With opening the PDF's via Edge, we are able to print form to MS Print to PDF and upon doing so and opening with Reader or Acrobat Pro the form data is viewable.  I have checked the versions of Reader and Acrobat Pro and both are up to date as well. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

[jonathanb45291220]

Using Acrobat Pro 2024.

I fixed it by using Prepare Form and highlighting the form fields. Then, I selected properties and toggled the visible to hidden and back to visible settings.

[milesdeelite]

Had the same problem. Fillable Form Fields and Radio Buttons did not display in chrome.

The solution is in fact pretty simple:

Make sure “Fast web view” is not active.

You can check this by opening the PDF within chrome > selecting “Document properties”.

If “Fast web view” displays “Yes” open the PDF in Acrobat Reader and check “menu” > “preferences” > “documents” > “Save As optimizes for Fast Web View”. It has to be unchecked. Save a Copy of the PDF and the forms are displayed as it should be. Interactive PDFs right out of InDesign do not have this setting, so this is one extra step to make sure it works with any build in PDF viewer.

I hope this will help affected users.

[Joe2994949172e1]

I WAS ABLE TO FIGURE IT OUT!!!

For the life of me I was just so stuck on not being able to figure it out I did everything. But I can finally confirm that, I GOT IT! 
All you had to do was 

Check the Form Properties

• Open the PDF in Adobe Acrobat or a PDF reader that allows form editing (such as Adobe Acrobat Pro).
• Ensure that the form fields have not been set to "Read Only" after you filled them out. You can do this by clicking on "Tools" > "Prepare Form" and checking the properties of the fields.

From there youll see it say "Locked" 
Unclick "locked" and get rid of "Read-Only"

Click "Form Field:" and click "Visible" 
You can also Shift + Click all of them and do them all at once! 

Happy Forming! 

[Anastasiia377113406bpl]

You just need to change text field properties in Adobe Acrobat -> Edit PDF -> Right Click on a field and choose properties -> Options -> Check Multi -line and Scroll long text

[Annie33024059m06n]

Easiest method is to save the document on your OneDrive > open the document in your Adobe Acrobat BROWSER (NOT App) > This should show the filled fields.
Print as Microsoft pdf or Adobe pdf.

[aleks_1724]

Hello.

Everything discussed from 2020 is not a solution at all ... My point is that when advisers here write "Problem solved" which require changing something every time you open PDF file - they provide wrong directions, they provide workarounds, not fixes ...  Clients are picky and they don't want to do all those tweaking steps over and over again with each PDF file, they consider them annoying ... The solution should work once and for all cases ... There should be some kind of Adobe Acrobat Pro configuration feature change that works no matter which software was used to create PDF 

[Meenakshi Negi]

Hi aleks_1724,

Thank you for reaching out.

As suggested, the issue generally occurs when the document is filled using other software. If the problem arises when the PDF is filled via the Adobe application, let us know.

You may share your suggestion on this with the team via the following help document: https://adobe.ly/4ibswef. 

Thanks,

Meenakshi

[aleks_1724]

Hello,

Thank you for your response.

It appears that "other software" is Adobe Designer generating forms from
web site.

So, Adobe has Acrobat and Designer which are not in sync.

This is a shame and we are suffering from it.

Thanks.

Regards.
Aleks.