How Long Does it Take to Learn Adobe Acrobat?

Like many aspiringprofessionals, you might want to learn Adobe Acrobat but worry that it will be too time-consuming. Acrobat is a straightforward program, and new users can expect to be proficient in its basic features in only a few hours of training. More advanced functions, such as those only available through a Pro subscription, will take longer to learn. Of course, this depends on several factors. Keep reading to learn about how you can learn Adobe Acrobat and some resources to help speed the process along.

What is Adobe Acrobat?

Adobe Acrobat is the most commonly used application for reading, displaying, and editing documents in Adobe’s portable document format (PDF). The PDF file extension is designed as a universal text and image display system that can display on any machine, regardless of what applications, hardware, or operating system you are using. Adding the extension makes Adobe Acrobat a vital tool for cross-platform collaboration and design processes. It is also essential for securely authorizing, signing, and archiving important documents, including transcripts, tax filings, and other legal documents. 

Adobe is also constantly striving to ensure that Acrobat is more than just a PDF reader. While there is a freeware version of the application to let any user read documents, Acrobat Pro lets users edit, manipulate, and otherwise prepare PDF documents for distribution. Importantly, it also allows users to convert PDFs to word documents, excel spreadsheets, or even jpegs, which is an integral part of optimizing specific professional processes. Between these features and essential quality-of-life benefits, such as combining documents into a single PDF, compressing PDFs, and automated features ensuring documents meet specific critical legal regulations, Adobe Acrobat is one of the most versatile and vital baseline tools available.

Read more about what Adobe Acrobat is and why you should learn it. 

What Can You Do with Adobe Acrobat?

Adobe Acrobat is a versatile software program that lets users create and share PDF files that can be read and edited on almost any device. The program is important for both collaborative design work and for documenting and archiving important documents. Using Adobe Acrobat makes remote work more accessible and efficient since Acrobat includes authentication and documentation features that allow users to encrypt, protect, sign, and notarize documents without meeting with a signee in-person. These built-in collaboration features can improve both workflow efficiency and the kinds of work that is practical for a given company or organization.

Adobe Acrobat is also one of the most commonly used tools for archiving and preserving important documents. PDF readers can produce high-quality scans of physical documents and display them on almost any modern device. This ability makes Adobe Acrobat a valuable tool for making rare or sensitive documents more accessible to the public. It also ensures that individuals can easily create and access backup versions of physical documents they want to keep protected. Since Acrobat also has significant privacy and security features, learning Acrobat is an excellent way to ensure that these documents are appropriately protected when you need others to access them.

Average Time it Takes to Learn Adobe Acrobat

Students seeking to learn how to use the basic features of Adobe can learn it by investing a few hours. Most of the basics are easily learned with a quick video. However, learners looking for more in-depth training may need a few weeks of dedicated study to master the program's advanced features.

Other Factors

A few factors will contribute to the time it takes to learn Acrobat. Students looking to pair Acrobat training with other skills instruction will naturally take longer to complete their training. Attendees looking to learn advanced Acrobat skills will require more time.

Form of Training

Acrobat training will be part of a more extensive professional skills curriculum for most students. The time it takes to learn Acrobat may be tied to how long it takes to learn those other new skills. Taking a class that teaches multiple software programs is ideal since more than Acrobat is needed to help future graduates break into a new field, yet a class that covers multiple software will be longer. However, learning more than one may be easier since learners may benefit from the supplemental instruction.

Advanced Acrobat Skills

In general, professional uses of Acrobat fall into two categories. Some lightly-use Acrobat to read and annotate PDFs and to store documents. Enrollees can pick up these basic skills rather quickly. However, other professional Acrobat users heavily use the program to streamline complex administrative tasks, create PDFs that serve as fillable data forms, and archive extensive collections of digitized documents. Prospective students learning these skills will need more time to master Acrobat but will benefit from this additional training in their professional lives.

Level of Difficulty, Prerequisites, & Cost 

Adobe Acrobat is an incredibly accessible tool; most users can learn the program's essential functions in only a few hours of training. While more advanced functions, particularly those intended to complement other Adobe skills, will require more training, becoming proficient in the program for day-to-day use is one of the more accessible professional skills a student can acquire.

As an entry-level program, Adobe Acrobat has no formal prerequisites for learning the essential functions save for proficiently navigating a desktop computer. Adobe Acrobat training is accessible to almost everyone. It is also an excellent place to start learning the basic skills surrounding documenting, archiving and managing large amounts of essential files and documents.

Adobe offers three different versions of Acrobat to users. Acrobat Reader is a free version that strips out most of the program's advanced features and serves as an essential PDF reading, creating, documenting, and annotating application. For most users, this will be the version of the program that is most frequently utilized. At the mid-tier level, Adobe offers Acrobat Standard to Windows users, including more creation and editing tools for about twelve dollars a month. Adobe also offers Acrobat Pro, a paid service that allows users to import, export, and convert PDF files to other formats. It also allows users to manipulate and edit PDFs and prepare them for publication or Cloud storage and distribution. Acrobat Pro is a part of the Adobe Creative Cloud, which moved to a subscription model in 2013. Users can purchase a license for Acrobat Pro for about twenty dollars a month or a license to the entire Creative Cloud for approximately fifty-five dollars a month.

Read about how difficult it is to learn Adobe Acrobat.

Watch a Free Adobe Acrobat Online Course

Students who want to learn the basic features of Adobe Acrobat but cannot enroll in a full training seminar may consider taking advantage of free training programs. These training programs are excellent for students who feel they need to get a basic grasp of working with PDF applications but aren’t sure they need to learn the more advanced elements of the program. These courses tend to be cursory overviews of the features and functions of programs like Acrobat; for many professionals, that is all they will need.

Noble Desktop offers several free Adobe courses, including an Introduction to Adobe Creative Cloud video seminar. In this class, students will learn the basics of Adobe Acrobat and various programs that collectively make up the Adobe Creative Cloud. This course is designed with prospective designers in mind. However, its overview of the functionalities of Acrobat will assist students who otherwise aren’t interested in learning tools like Photoshop. This course eases trainees into more professional training programs, so it is also a worthwhile resource for students who intend to learn Acrobat to complement other Adobe Creative Cloud skills.

Students may also explore more options for free Adobe Acrobat courses through service providers such as Udemy or Coursera. These training courses will vary from broad overviews of the Adobe catalog to narrow video tutorials covering the basics of Acrobat as a standalone program. Learners may also consult the free tutorial options available directly from Adobe.

Read about more free Adobe Acrobat videos and online tutorials.

Learn Adobe Acrobat with Hands-on Training at Noble Desktop

Individuals hoping to learn Adobe Acrobat will have a few options available. Noble Desktop offers private and group Adobe Acrobat training in-person at Noble’s Manhattan campus and online in live digital classrooms. These courses allow students to learn advanced Acrobat skills with the assistance of live instructors. Enrollees will work with hands-on examples that mirror the kinds of real-world applications for which they will employ Acrobat, and can ask questions and receive direct feedback from their instructors. Enrollees attending these courses will benefit from small class sizes, even online. Anyone who takes a course through Noble can retake that course within a calendar year, giving individuals s even more opportunities to master Adobe Acrobat.

Those wanting to learn Adobe Acrobat can enroll in Noble’s Adobe Acrobat Training course. This course is beginner-friendly and designed to get students comfortable with the key functionalities of Acrobat that they require in their day-to-day lives. This course will get new students up to speed by teaching them how to edit, merge, combine, arrange, share, and protect PDF files using Acrobat. This class is a great way to learn the ins and outs of Adobe Acrobat quickly. In this course, students will learn everything they need to know about storing, annotating, and working with PDF files. 

Another advantage to learning Adobe Acrobat is that it is part of the Adobe Creative Cloud suite of tools and is therefore both heavily integrated with those applications and is one of the best ways to display designs on any device. Creative professionals, in particular, will want to learn Adobe Acrobat as part of their training in other Adobe Creative programs. Students learning skills like Photoshop, Illustrator, or InDesign will want to ensure they know how to improve their workflow efficiency using Acrobat.

Key Insights

• Adobe Acrobat is the most commonly used application for creating and viewing digital documents worldwide. A large part of its popularity is that curious individuals can quickly learn it.
• Users hoping to learn the basics of the program can do so in only a few hours. Advanced skills will take longer to learn, but they can still be picked up in only a few days or weeks of dedicated study.
• Many students learn Acrobat alongside other programs more directly required in a given professional field. These students will find that their training will take longer but may pay more significant future dividends.
• One way to speed up your Acrobat training is by enrolling in a professional training course, such as the live in-person and online Acrobat classes offered through Noble Desktop.