Turn off / disable Convert to Text Option in Acrobat Pro DC

Report · May 19, 2015

Since the update on Acrobat to Pro DC, I keep having to click on Revert to Image, which would be fine but sometimes to revert to image, it undoes the changes I may have recently changed. The only workaround I found was to make changes on the picture (in Photoshop) then save the PDF, close it and reopen to make additional changes. I cannot stress this enough, I NEED the fonts to stay outlined so I don't get any errors when transferring postscripts from PC to Mac. And I'm talking about files that are exported from other programs, not scanned.

Anyone know how to disable the Convert to Text option?

Report · Apr 01, 2025

Hello!

I hope you are doing well.

To disable the automatic conversion of scanned documents to editable text (OCR) in Adobe Acrobat Pro DC, follow these steps:

Open the PDF in Adobe Acrobat Pro DC:
- Launch Adobe Acrobat and open your scanned document.
Access the 'Edit PDF' Tool:
- Click on the "Tools" tab.
- Select "Edit PDF" from the available options.
Disable Automatic OCR:
- In the right pane, locate and uncheck the "Recognize text" option. This prevents Acrobat from automatically running OCR on scanned documents in the future.

By unchecking the "Recognize text" option, Acrobat will no longer automatically convert scanned documents to editable text during editing. For more detailed information, refer to this help article: https://adobe.ly/4caFp5M

Also, please ensure you have the latest version of Acrobat installed, and check for any pending updates from the Menu > help > check for updates, install the updates, restart the app and the machine, and check. For more information, see this: https://adobe.ly/44adelt

If you wish to raise a feature request, please use this URL and submit it to the product team.

Thanks,

Anand Sri.

View solution in original post

Report · Mar 10, 2016

The fact that I cannot disable the Page Recognition function is absolutely garbage. It is wasting a lot of my time and my boss isn't very happy about it. Thanks Adobe

Report · Apr 27, 2016

same here, please make this optional. all i want to do is crop some scanned pages in acrobat and everything gets messed up by the OCR. i love the built in OCR when i need to use it, but only when i need it.

Report · Apr 27, 2016

It appears I may have been overly critical of the crop features. counter-intuitively, the "sensible" crop feature has been moved to the Organize Pages tab. I don't know why there isn't a crop button in this tab, but if you right-click on a page and hit crop it will bring up the standard crop dialogue.

Report · Apr 28, 2016

Me too.

i really want to turn off OCR recognition. I will try the workaround of 'revert to image' on a trivial document.

But I have several documents that I have added text to and I dont want to revert to image on those. Each time the next page gets focus, OCR starts.

Really should be an off option.

I am marking student maths work, some of which is scans. I add text

Report · May 12, 2016

Hi,

If you are updated to the latest version of Acrobat DC, you would be able to turn OCR recognition off by clicking on "Revert to Image". The option is now sticky, and editing subsequent pages/documents will not run OCR recognition.

Report · Jun 17, 2016

That is not good enough, disable the feature entirely with an option in preference, and disable as part of the loading of "Edit PDF" Talk about blatantly ignoring or request to disable the feature entire. Could you not do these half measures, and add the option to disable OCR entirely across Acrobat DC.

Report · Feb 06, 2019

Refreshing this thread, Acrobat Pro DC (CC 2019) does not behave as Adobe describes in their online user guide (link below), which says "To turn off automatic OCR: In the right pane, clear the Recognize text check box. From next time [sic], Acrobat won't automatically run OCR and convert a scanned document to editable text." Acrobat honors that setting for each subsequent file opened, but only until quitting Acrobat. Upon reopening Acrobat, the setting is lost and when going to the Edit PDF pane in the first opened PDF file, Acrobat always recognizes text on the first page and turns on the "Recognize Text" check box. This needs to either be fixed or an option provided to make it stick.

https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/using/edit-scanned-pdfs.html

Report · Feb 26, 2022

Open pdf in Acrobat
Wait for the first page to be scanned, or cancel immediately (this time only)
Sellect Edit menu
Uncheck "Recognize Text" under settings (this will prevent future)
Close and open any document.

Report · Jan 09, 2024

This option is grayed out for me. I have become extremely unhappy with Acrobat. Get it together, folks. I have a 1500 page document of scanned hand-written notes, no interest in or hope of ever doing OCR on them. I just want to index them and add links here and there. Every time I got to a new page, I get the "converting to text" action and then I have to undo it because to totally butchers the page.

It must be miserable to work on this team.

Report · Oct 12, 2023

Adobe - STOP! Just STOP!
Every time you add a new "feature" that nobody uses, you slow down or break your product, then you ignore all of us loyal users who have been using your products for years (without issue). This new Adobe Acrobat is SLOW AS CHRISTMAS. It takes nearly 30 seconds to load a simple 2 page PDF. I dont need all the extra "crap" you have added - I just need a way to read PDF's (most of the time) and occassionally do light editing like changing page order or rotating a scanned image ... just give me a way to go back to what we had - please!

Report · Jun 26, 2025

Hello from the future, just in case anyone, like me, ends up here to answer this question at some point, let me tell you how to do it here in 2025.

Click on Edit, then click the Edit Settings gear wheel in the top of the Edit panel. Uncheck recognize scanned text. They really did add a checkbox for it. A nice surprise.