Importing psb/tiff in Illustrator no longer works?

[JesLeaMac]

I am trying to import a .psb or even a .tif into Illustrator but when the ball is done spinning, nothing updates. I know these files are compatible with Illustrator as I've done this before as well as it lists .psb and .tif in the dropdown as compatible files.

[Monika Gause]

How much RAM is installed on your computer?

How large are those files?

[JesLeaMac]

64 GB of ram on the computer and the file sizes of the images are large. One is 1.19 GB and the other is 2.96 GB.

[Anubhav M]

Hello @JesLeaMac,

Sorry to hear about this experience. Would you mind confirming if you are checking the option to Link the PSB file before placing it in Illustrator and sharing your observations?

Looking forward to your response.

Thanks,

Anubhav

[JesLeaMac]

Yes, my linked box is checked

[Kevin Stohlmeyer]

How much free HD space do you have? What is the uncompressed size of your psb or tiff files?

[JesLeaMac]

I have 1.15 TB available in my HD. One of my pdb file size is 1.19 GB. I deleted the other one as I am running experiments on it.

[Kevin Stohlmeyer]

Is that uncompressed or the compressed size? You can check the actual size under Image Size in PS.

Illustrator manages the uncompressed document sizes, not the compressed/saved sizes.

[JesLeaMac]

Ok so interesting... the file size in Finder is 1.19 GB and the file size in PS is 2.42 GB. Why is that? Does Illustrator have a size file cap for import that I am not aware of?

[Kevin Stohlmeyer]

PSB has built in file compression. There isnt a file size cap per se, but it does affect the overall size of the AI file and can cause issues if your system isn't able to handle it.

Honestly I've never put such a large file in my AI file before - I've always flattened and imported a jpg or tiff without layers simply because it keeps AI agile without bloat.

[Anubhav M]

Hello @JesLeaMac,

Thanks for confirming that. Would you mind checking if Illustrator behaves this way with other files? If yes, kindly share a sample file by following the steps shared in this community post (https://community.adobe.com/t5/illustrator-discussions/share-your-files-in-6-simple-steps/td-p/12967...), so we can check it on our end.

Looking forward to your response.

Regards.

[Mike_Gondek]

What version of Illustrator are you running?

Have you restarted your mac and reset your prefs?

PREFS  RESET MAC (thorough method) Change 27 to your latest version

Quit Illustrator

Finder >> Shift Command G

~/Library/Preferences/Adobe Illustrator 27 Settings/en_US/Adobe Illustrator Prefs

rename Adobe Illustrator 27 to Adobe Illustrator 27old

[JesLeaMac]

It is the latest version, 27.3.1

I restarted the Mac, but not the preferences. I can't give that a try, but I'm getting close to the due date so I am most likely going to rebuild in InDesign. Thanks for the advice!

[Mike_Gondek]

Also ensure you have a working printer chosen. A corrupted printer driver could cause this.

[JesLeaMac]

I have my office printer drive in my printer settings, but I am not at the office, WFH

[Kevin Stohlmeyer]

Remove the printer and try again.

[Brad @ Roaring Mouse]

Where are your files located? If they are on an external drive, check your Mac's Security & Privacy settings for Full Disk Access for your Adobe Apps.

[JesLeaMac]

Files are on my computer, not an external hard drive

[defaultovpgm6w21r7j]

I'm running into the exact same problem.

• Illustrator 2025 (29.0)
• 64GB RAM, 1TB hard drive, new Macbook M3 Max (received a month ago), latest OS version (Sequoia 15.0.1), so I doubt it's a power or memory issue, and it's so new I haven't installed any printer drivers, so there are none to interfere with this.
• .psb file on my hard drive that is between 1 - 2GB
• Trying to relink a smaller .psd to this larger .psb using "relink" in Links panel, but it just shows the loading wheel, and nothing happens.
• Tried File > Place to no avail. Yes, the "Link" option for Place is checked.
• Saving as a .tif and trying to use that instead of the .psb did not work.
• Doesn't matter if my .ai file is CMYK and .psb is CMYK or RGB. Didn't matter if there was transparency or multiple layers or just one. Tried all sorts of combinations.
• I did drag and drop the same .psb file into the document rather than place or relink, and the image "frame" appeared, but there was no visible image. So I saved, closed the file, re-opened, and was met with a message: "An error occurred trying to read the linked file. Choose Replace to select another file or Ignore to leave the link unchanged."

Adobe either needs to fix the support for linking .psb files, or give us a message that says, "cannot read .psb files." Incredibly frustrating for the program to act like it opened/linked/placed the file, when it did not do so.

The band-aid solution I have for now is to make a .psd just under 1GB.

[Kevin Stohlmeyer]

@defaultovpgm6w21r7j did you confirm Illustrator is set to "Full Disk Access" in the Mac OS System settings/Security and Privacy? Sounds like a permissions issue reading the location of the PSB file.

[defaultovpgm6w21r7j]

Thank you for the suggestion. The setting was not turned on, so I amended this, but unfortunately, this did not solve the issue. Illustrator behaves the same as it did before. 

Question: if this had been the issue, why would it read multiple .psd files from the same folder, but not work for the .psb files? I'm guessing that for this specific problem, the issue is on Adobe's end, not individual computers.

[Anubhav M]

Hello @defaultovpgm6w21r7j,

I am sorry to hear about your experience. I tried replicating this on my end but could not. Would you mind sharing a screen recording of your entire workflow including the problem, and a link to a sample AI and PSD/PSB file so I can try and check it on my end?

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Anubhav

[Phil5C41]

Hi @JesLeaMac @defaultovpgm6w21r7j - Did you ever manage to resolve the main issue without the work around? Or anyone else manage to find out why?

I'm producing large outdoor artwork and my images need to be 300dpi at the final size, resulting in images being 4-7Gb, so psb and tiff is the only option, I can only use illustrator to build the artwork too as InDesign is limited in dimensions. Printers have stated they won't accept 1/4 or 10th. I can't risk slicing the images into smaller images and piecing back together. 

One thing I tried is dragging the psb directly onto Illustrator, which opens a new doc with that image in, I can then copy/paste this over, but still unsure if it's ok as the link name excludes the .psb extension.

update: slimmed the photoshop file down and sized to 30000pxwide (less high), managed to save as psd at around 700mb and still get an empty box in illustrator!

[Anubhav M]

Hello @Phil5C41,

Would you mind sharing a screen recording of your entire workflow, including the problem, system report (Windows / macOS), and a link to a sample AI and PSD/PSB file after uploading it to a file-sharing service, so I can try to check it on my end?

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Anubhav

[Phil5C41]

Hi @Anubhav M,

Here's a link with the following included:

1. screen recording

2. sample ai

3. sample psb

4. sample tiff

Note: You'll also get an image error when opening up the ai file, this always mirrors the empty box issue.

If you get to this too late, let me know your email address.

If you want a system report (Mac), please let me know your email, or if you have mine, email to request.

Thanks,

Phil