How do I edit my PDF document?

Summary: How to Edit a PDF.

Note that these are instructions directly edit (and permanently change) the content in the PDF. Editorial mark up and commenting is in the next section below.

1. Open the PDF in Acrobat Standard or Pro. FYI, the free Adobe Reader does not have tools for editing a PDF.
    
2. Open the Edit PDF tool panel. It's either already docked to the right side of your screen, or you can open it from the TOOLS tab (upper left corner).
   
   
   
3. Two sets of tools appear, one across the top of the screen, the other in the right-side panel.
   — Click inside a paragraph of text and you can add, delete, and format text.
   — Click on the 3 dots ... in the upper right toolbar for more options.
   — Click on an image and you can select Replace Image from the right-side panel.
   
4. Note that you can't edit an image directly in Acrobat because the software doesn't have image editing features. But you can open it in your preferred graphics program, make the image adjustments there, and bring the revised graphic back into Acrobat.

How to make editorial markups in a PDF.

These are generally used by editors and proofreaders to place visible editing marks on the PDF. These tools do not actually change the content like the above tools.

1. Open the PDF in Acrobat Standard or Pro. FYI, the free Adobe Reader does not have tools for editing a PDF.
    
2. Open the Comment tool panel. It's either already docked to the right side of your screen, or you can open it from the TOOLS tab (upper left corner).
   
   
   
3. Two sets of tools appear, one across the top of the screen, the other in the right-side panel.
   — Tools across the top let you mark-up the text: insert, delete/cross-out, add text, and draw symbols and call-out boxes.
   — The right side holds a list of comments that have been added to the PDF.
   
   
   
   
4. To change the color of any comment or editorial markup, either:
   — Right click on the comment, select Properties, and choose another color. It can be a one-time change or for comments going forward.
   — If your screen is wide enough, you might have the color circle icon in the top toolbar.
   

Suggestions:

• The default blue used for editorial markups is difficult to see in a PDF (in the above screen capture, there's one just below the subhead "Basic Lists"). So I change my color to a bright red which helps everyone spot where the editorial changes are to be made.
• When you click a comment in the right-side comment panel, the actual comment will be highlighted in the PDF text.
• Other editors can reply to a comment directly in the original comment. Very handy way to have a group discussion about the content.
• And the little checkbox can be used to indicate that the editorial change has been accepted. (But remember, the checkbox doesn't actually change the content in the PDF — Comment Tools are only editorial markup and comments.)

Hope this helps Acrobat users.