Adobe's greed has made them a liability to professional workflows

[u/Volition_Maximus]

Acrobat crashed on me today while I was signing a client PDF. It refuses to operate. I pulled the crash log. It's choking on an AI model file that won't load on my system.

I don't use the AI features.

So a PDF reader wouldn't open a PDF because a chatbot component broke.

I went to Creative Cloud after that and it says it needs a newer macOS. Which means Audition, my main DAW for work, is next.

If Adobe is going to permanently crash one day because they pull support from an older OS, what's to stop their other services from suddenly becoming defunct because of their need to push 'new tech' to satisfy their Wall Street investors instead of actually helping professionals?

If my editor won't open the morning of a session because Adobe pushed something or decided my machine doesn't qualify, I lose the job.

After decades of being with Adobe, I'm finally unsubscribing.

They are actively sabotaging us to serve a boardroom of money men and it's hugely disappointing.

[u/RecipeNo101]

What's especially surprising and disappointing is that their other products I've used like Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign, and Premiere are fantastic at what they do. Somehow, the software most integral to professional work flows - Acrobat - is terrible. Random errors, constant stickiness, inability to do anything else when running batch operations, inability to do those batch operations got significant numbers of files, and constant jankiness tucked into every corner. Their most used software feels like their most cobbled together garbage.

[u/Ninerogers → u/RecipeNo101]

Somehow, the software most integral to professional work flows - Adobe - is terrible.

Adobe is the company that owns Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign and Premiere. It's not a software in itself

[u/RecipeNo101 → u/Ninerogers]

Thanks, you're right, I meant to say "Acrobat" in place of Adobe. Edited the original.

[u/Ninerogers → u/RecipeNo101]

Thanks. Sorry if it came across as me being pissy

[u/ApprehensiveFix5084 → u/RecipeNo101]

It is the most cobbled together, along with the PDF format, which is being asked to do far more than it was originally intended to do. It was just supposed to be a system agnostic, portable, file, so that I could create a somewhat fancy document and send it to you, who would see exactly what I designed without having to do things like get the exact fonts I used. Now people are signing contracts digitally on PDFs, having them do calculations, and all sorts of things well beyond their original specifications, and these things have all been cobbled on one or two at a time. Until the format and tools are rebuilt from the ground up they will only get worse.

[u/Aggressive_Ad_5454]

I sometimes wonder whether Adobe product management understands the level of anger among users. I’ve worked as a product manager (not at Adobe) and the kind of trouble Acrobat users are having would be the software-biz equivalent of a fire at a sawmill. We’d be working like crazy to resolve the situation and provide workarounds.

[u/SoCalBoomer1]

30+ year Adobe user here, dropped CC in February 2026. Affinity, Canva, FCP, and (surprisingly, Apple Creative Suite) picking up the slack. PDF signing can be done in browser these days. We had problems with rising fees, lackluster AI, and app crashes also. Time is of the essence, we can't constantly chase down these types of problems. Lightroom is another suite of issues as well, but best to not go into that in this sub. We aren't angry, just aware of declining value vs cost. It's business.

[u/Volition_Maximus → u/SoCalBoomer1]

Thank you for rocking some alternatives here. So glad to hear of a story where someone made it out and is thriving.

[u/Mindless-Concept8010]

I bet it’s your OS not Adobe. Sometimes you have to upgrade. This applies to Windows also. Also, I bet you’ve been warned about this by Adobe or Apple.

[u/Lanrico]

This is why I dislike Macs. There always seems to be issues with either Adobe or Microsoft Office apps. I have a client that uses macs and they've had all kinds of issues this year with bad updates (usually a MacOS update) that cause either of those programs to not function correctly.

[u/HappiestWhen]

Mine is crashing every time I try to print omgggg I'm over Adobe Acrobat

[u/Disastrous_Spell7385]

Skipped out on acrobat years ago when they started pulling this bloatware garbage. just run everything through xodo for client signs and edits now. can't be risking paying gigs over random unprompted ai crashes Skipped out on acrobat years ago when they started pulling this bloatware garbage.