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TheOriginalGC
Community Expert
TheOriginalGCCommunity Expert
Community Expert
July 19, 2025
Question

Recently, Illustrator has forgotten how to do duplex printing (Win)

  • July 19, 2025
  • 2 replies
  • 659 views

Up until recently, I have had no problem sending output from Illustrator to my duplex laser printer on my Windows 11 system. Even now, when I print a PDF file from my browser, it still will print on both sides as requested. However, now when I print from Illustrator and specify duplex printing, the request is ignored and the print job comes out single-sided. I am not sure what I need to do to get the program to honor my request to print on both sides of the page.

 

Things I have tried:

  • Updated the printer drivers to the latest version.
  • Went into Windows settings and changed the default for this printer to double-sided printing.

What else can I try to troubleshoot this?

2 replies

Abhishek Rao
Community Manager
Abhishek RaoCommunity Manager
Community Manager
July 28, 2025

Hi @TheOriginalGC,

 

Thanks for confirming that resetting preferences didn't help. Since duplex printing works fine from other apps and the issue is specific to Illustrator, it might be related to how Illustrator is handling printer specific settings. Can you please try printing via File > Print, then click Setup… (at the bottom left) and choose Preferences in the system dialog that opens? Make sure duplex is enabled there as well before confirming and coming back to Illustrator's Print dialog.

Also, just to double-check, does the issue happen with all Illustrator files or only certain ones? Are you printing directly to the printer or via a print preset?

 

Let me know how that goes so we can dig deeper if needed!

Abhishek 

TheOriginalGC
Community Expert
TheOriginalGCCommunity ExpertAuthor
Community Expert
July 28, 2025

Opening the print setup dialog presents me with this screen:

As you can see, there is no option for preferences in the dialog. The only possiple option is "More settings," which opens this:

Is this what you mean? I have used this dialog frequently to use the "Print on Both Sides" setting, which, until recently, was working fine.

 

I am printing directly to the printer via the home network. Not only does it appear to happen with every print job from Illustrator, but also when printing from Illustrator Beta.

Anubhav M
Community Manager
Anubhav MCommunity Manager
Community Manager
July 28, 2025

Hello @TheOriginalGC,

Thanks for the confirmation. Could you try restoring the legacy print dialog by following the suggestions shared in this third-party help article (https://adobe.ly/4lOwMSm) to see if it helps?

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Anubhav

creative explorer
Community Expert
creative explorerCommunity Expert
Community Expert
July 24, 2025

@TheOriginalGC if it worked before, and suddendly it didn't, it likely be corrupted Illustrator Prefernces. 

https://helpx.adobe.com/ca/illustrator/using/setting-preferences.html

 

m
TheOriginalGC
Community Expert
TheOriginalGCCommunity ExpertAuthor
Community Expert
July 28, 2025

Thank you for your reply. Unfortunately, resetting the preferences did not affect how the program communicates with the printer.

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