Mac Preview unable to read PDFs

[eytonxav]

Suddenly I am having problem with opening pdf attachments that are attached to messages in apple mail. These used to work without issue and would open via Preview app. Now I get an error message that says file xxxx.pdf cannot be opened. It may be damaged or use a file format that Preview doesn’t recognize.

I do not these files are damaged. I suspect Adobe may have changed something that is now causing this. Adobe also does not currently have a reader for Mac Ventura. Anyone else encounter this and have a fix.

 

[braumeister]

I just opened a pdf attached to a mail message this morning. It opened in Preview as normal.

Have you rebooted your machine? That's always my first action when something like this happens.

Can you download the attached pdf and then open it in Preview?

Another option is to start up in Safe Mode and see if it works then.

 

[PaunchyPirate]

Suddenly I am having problem with opening pdf attachments that are attached to messages in apple mail. These used to work without issue and would open via Preview app. Now I get an error message that says file xxxx.pdf cannot be opened. It may be damaged or use a file format that Preview doesn’t recognize.

I do not these files are damaged. I suspect Adobe may have changed something that is now causing this. Adobe also does not currently have a reader for Mac Ventura. Anyone else encounter this and have a fix.

What happens if you try to open a PDF outside of Apple Mail? Ones stored on your hard drive from last month, for example.

Also, I have Adobe Acrobat Reader installed and working fine (as near as I can tell) with the current released version of MacOS. I'm on Ventura Version 13.1. However, it was probably installed when I was on version 12.x (whatever that was called). Does Adobe actually prohibit you from installing it?

I never liked how Preview worked with PDF files, so I always set Acrobate Reader as my default PDF viewer. Never had any issues.

 

[eytonxav]

I just opened a pdf attached to a mail message this morning. It opened in Preview as normal.

Have you rebooted your machine? That's always my first action when something like this happens.

Can you download the attached pdf and then open it in Preview?

Another option is to start up in Safe Mode and see if it works then.

What happens if you try to open a PDF outside of Apple Mail? Ones stored on your hard drive from last month, for example.

Also, I have Adobe Acrobat Reader installed and working fine (as near as I can tell) with the current released version of MacOS. I'm on Ventura Version 13.1. However, it was probably installed when I was on version 12.x (whatever that was called). Does Adobe actually prohibit you from installing it?

I never liked how Preview worked with PDF files, so I always set Acrobate Reader as my default PDF viewer. Never had any issues.

This began last week when I received an email with multiple attached pdf files. Some opened fine, but a few I could not open at all. I attributed the problem to be the overall files size of the email which was quite large. However, todays email had two pdf attachments, one opened without issue while the other would not and neither are large files. I have tried restarting the Mac, no change. I can also open pdf attachments in older emails without issue.

In doing google search came to find out there is no Adobe Acrobat reader for Ventura and it indicated it is best to wait for Adobe to come out with a version for Ventura vs installing an older version.

I have not tried safe mode.

 

[PaunchyPirate]

... I can also open pdf attachments in older emails without issue.

Your issue sounds more of a problem with the particular emails and the nature of the attached PDFs and not a problem with Preview.

 

[braumeister]

How about control-clicking the pdf in Mail and selecting "Open with ..." and choose Preview.

 

[eytonxav]

Your issue sounds more of a problem with the particular emails and the nature of the attached PDFs and not a problem with Preview.

Perhaps, but seems strange this happened very recently and with the emails coming from two different people. Is it Abode, the email pipeline, Preview or something else