Cannot Fill in PDF Form Mac – Here Are WHY & HOW
“Hello, I cannot fill in PDF form MAC OS because it seems its fields are locked. Please tell me a proficient solution to fill PDF form on Mac OS X without using Adobe Acrobat Pro.”
– Sara, New York
“Can you tell me how to fill out a PDF form on MAC using Preview.”
– Stephanie, California
As you can see I have taken two different problems related to PDF forms on Mac Operating System. Sara is having a PDF that is locked and that is why she can’t fill out a PDF form on MAC. And Stephanie wants to know how to use the Preview application in filling out a PDF form.
In this blog you will have two key takeaways:
- How to unlock PDF form on Mac Operating System
- How to use Mac preview to fill PDF form.
Before giving the solutions to these questions. Let us have a look at PDF security types.
Three are two ways to secure a PDF document:
- User-Protected PDF- This PDF document simply has a password. And those who have this password can open the PDF and see the content in it.
- Owner-protected- This PDF has restrictions on it. Restrictions like you cannot edit a PDF or Print a PDF file and so on. You will need a permission password and then with the help of Adobe Acrobat Pro, you can remove restrictions.
In Sara’s query, she is having an Owner-Protected PDF form. She will have to remove the restrictions using the permission password in Acrobat Pro. But you can see in her query, that she does not want to use Adobe Application, and also she has not mentioned if she is having a permission password.
Let’s assume she is not having the permission password. So in this case, PDF Restriction Remover For Mac can help to eliminate PDF form restrictions without a permission password. It’s affordable too.
Note: Download JDK & JRE 8 to run this application. Click Here
Let us see How it unlocks PDF form fields on MAC OS.
How to Unlock a PDF Form Using This Automated Tool
This tool is compatible with MAC OS X 10.8 and above. This is a very simple-to-use application. You can download its Free version to try out. Just follow these steps:
- Launch Mac PDF Unlocker to remove restrictions in your system. After starting the tool click Add File(s) or Add Folder(s) option to insert the restricted PDF form.
- Your resultant PDF document will be saved on the desktop. To save it somewhere else click on the ‘Change‘ button.
- Lastly, click on the Unlock button.
Now you can easily fill out your PDF form.
Note: This tool is completely safe and does not distort any text, page layout, and margins of your PDF documents.
If you want to unlock the PDF form using Acrobat Pro Read:
Cannot Fill in PDF Form Mac – Solve it Using Preview
Mac Preview is an image and a PDF viewer application that can also help in editing these files. Follow these steps to fill out a PDF form in the Preview application:
- Open the PDF form you want to fill out in the Preview app on the Mac system. Also if your PDF form is on the web, download or saves it locally first.
- Now, just simply click into each of the form fields in the PDF and fill it with suitable text.
- Review your PDF form to see if it has been completed and if all necessary details and information have been filled out.
- When fully examined, go to the “File” menu and choose “Save” >> “Export”, or “Duplicate” – note that Save overwrites the existing PDF file and Duplicate will make the filled-out copy of the original PDF form. Also, if you are using MAC OS X Catalina, you will find the Duplicate option but if you are using lower versions then, you will find this same option as “Save As”.
Conclusion
In this write-up, I have tried to resolve “both cannot fill in PDF form Mac problems” with the easiest solutions. To unlock PDF form fields you can also go for Adobe Acrobat Pro. But you have to provide the permission password to discard restrictions. Also, while using the Preview application it can be possible, that you may not be able to fill out the PDF form. Because it has restrictions. Again you can use the above automated tool. Then, you can get ahead with the Preview.