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Fonts changing in files when opened in Illustrator 29.5.1

Forum|Forum|10 months ago
May 10, 2025
68 replies
47079 views

I've experienced this twice now, both times in the last month. I design beer labels and I'll often open an older label and use it as the template for a new one. When I open the older file (an .AI file), it will load, and most of the live text will have switched to a different font arbitrarily. Some fonts switch to OTHER typefaces that exist in the same document, others switch to different weights of the same font, and still others switch to defaults like times and myriad. Some of the switched fonts are stored locally, and others are served via Adobe Fonts. The file does this consistently even after I've restarted illustrator and restarted my computer.

I've attached a screenshot of one of the files with its original fonts (from an outlined version for print), as well as a shot with the changed fonts.

Has anyone else experienced this?

System:

2022 Mac Studio M1 Max

MacOS Sonoma 14.6.1

Illustrator v 29.5.1

Correct answer Anubhav M

Hello everyone,

Our team has attempted to resolve this issue in the latest Illustrator 30.x and 29.x releases. Kindly update to the latest version of Illustrator and try opening your files to see if the problem persists.

Anubhav

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R

raviraj_8074

Participant

I created a mailer in Illustrator with around 10–12 artboards and exported everything perfectly with the correct fonts. When I reopened the same file after two days to make changes, all the fonts had changed automatically, some text had disappeared, and the layout no longer matched my earlier exported JPGs. The fonts were installed and displaying correctly at the time of the first export, so the issue only appeared after reopening the saved file. I’ve attached the before/after GIF to show the difference.

J

JodyRadzik37240164

Inspiring

Welcome to the nightmare that is using Adobe Illustrator now. This issue has plagued hundreds of designers worldwide for the past few months without any satisfactory resolution.

kiml66753721

Participating Frequently

I am having the same issue in version 29.7.1

K

k9tag

Participating Frequently

Downgrade to 29.4 and your Illustrator life will be back to flowers and unicorns. Any version beyond that is hosed until they fix the devastating random font substitution bug, which they have thus far been unable to fix for at least two months and counting.

J

JodyRadzik37240164

Inspiring

Don't worry, I suspect they have their artificial intelligence working really hard on it. 🙄

J

JodyRadzik37240164

Inspiring

Downgrade to version 29.4.

kiml66753721

Participating Frequently

It's still happening in 29.4 for me

M

Miriam Mabel3677316339wf

Participant

I´ve had the same issue for a month now, and I´ve changed manually the fonts but it keeps changing enverytime i open my file. How can i solve this problem?

R

Randy_111

Participating Frequently

Try going back to 29.4, it seems to be last bug free version before this mess started.

K

k9tag

Participating Frequently

Anubhav M ==> Users are still reporting the random font substitution bug in Illustrator on the Mac and on the PC, in versons 29.5.x, 29.6.x, and 29.7.x, from all over the world, with translations even required to read the posts from users in Spain and Japan for example.... and the Adobe team can not replicate the issue in San Jose after a couple of months worth of worldwide input? I think that I can speak for the world when I say that's quite unfathomable. How about this: fly three or four of us out to San Jose and put us up at the Westin for a few days, and we can bring the Illustrator random font substitution bug to you at Adobe headquarters with our multiple windows laptops and Macbook Pros. You will then be able to replicate the issue in spades on your end, and just maybe find a solution.

L

Leyva

Participant

Well said my friend!

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Anubhav M

Community Manager

Hello everyone,

We are sorry for the trouble. We are having debug sessions for this issue with the product team, as we are unable to replicate the issue on our end. Would it be possible for you to have a debug session with us? If yes, please share your Adobe email ID, Phone number with country code, preferred time & day for the meeting, your timezone, and country & state you live in over the DM only.

I will be looking forward to your response.

Anubhav

R

Randy_111

Participating Frequently

Your only now admitting you can even replicate problem? How many weeks has this been.

W

William.Keffer

Participant

A última atualização fez com que as fontes dos meus projetos fossem alteradas, não preciso nem dizer as centenas de horas que precisaria para corrigir todos eles. Queria saber se há algum movimento para corrigir este absurdo.

Anubhav M

Community Manager

Hello @William.Keffer,

I'm sorry to hear about your experience. Our team is aware of this problem and is currently investigating it. Could you share a link to a sample AI file you're having trouble with, so we can check it on our end?

In the meantime, please try installing an earlier version of Illustrator (https://adobe.ly/4ly9pf3) and let us know if it helps.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Anubhav

W

William.Keffer

Participant

Eu retornei a versão antes da atualização, "apenas" o último trabalho que estava desenvolvendo desconfigurou todas as fontes. Atualizei novamente e continuou apenas o último trabalho desconfigurado. Perdi 6 horas de trabalho para modificar todas as fontes.

T

Timur342771060g07

Participant

Same problem here, I need to spend another day just to fix all the fonts on 14 labels that have a lot of text information 😞
Adobe Illustrator has had lots of bugs lately; maybe it is time to start learning CorelDRAW (Go back to the Stone Age) 🙂

Anubhav M

Community Manager

Hello @Timur342771060g07,

Our team has requested additional info. Could you kindly share a link to a sample file with this problem after uploading it to a file-sharing service, so that we can check it on our end?

Note: While sharing the link, kindly ensure it is set to Public and the option for Save a Copy/Download is enabled.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Anubhav

J

JodyRadzik37240164

Inspiring

You guys (Adobe personnel) don't appear to understand that this is commercial work on proprietary files that cannot be shared publicly. Real, live businesses and individual consultants are being deeply affected by the complete lack of quality control that Illustrator suffers from now. Trust in the product is evaporating with every new update because they now bring horrific consequences with their use. It's not up to us to lose more time providing examples of how poorly your product works now.

Anubhav M

Community Manager

Hello everyone,

Our team has requested additional info. Could you kindly share a link to a sample file with this problem after uploading it to a file-sharing service, so that we can check it on our end?

Note: While sharing the link, kindly ensure it is set to Public and the option for Save a Copy/Download is enabled.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Anubhav

katc60712215

Participating Frequently

We are a sign company and we are having the same issue with AI files. PDF shows correct font and spacing and AI file is corrupt. This is causing major issues when sending files to print.

The link is here:

https://we.tl/t-jA7WG7TEZd

Anubhav M

Community Manager

Hello @katc60712215,

Thanks for sharing the file. I have forwarded it to the product team. I will update this thread as I have more info.

Anubhav

B

bwatel

Participating Frequently

Exact same thing happening to me. Working on a master file with dozens of labels and all two families of fonts that are properly installed changed once to gibbrish (I had to renter text using the glyphs window!) worked well for a while, did it again and was fixed, then re-happened a few days later and was fixed just by restarting the computer. But what a waste fo time! This moning, same doc, it replaced two families with Myriad. I did a Find/Replace, only to find out that text on other locked layers has randomly dispeared in preview. Come on Adobe, you can do better than that, instead of fiddling with AI please let designers do their work.

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