Upgraded v9>v10 - Form Fields greyed out

[jeroen84]

I just upgraded from v9 to v10.2.1.3.

I'm no longer able to edit a PDF's form fields, which I was able to edit in v9.

If I right click on the Toolbar, I see that the "Form Fields" module is greyed out.


Any advise?

[Daniel - PDF-XChange]

Hello, jeroen84

When you say greyed out, I presume you mean it looks like this?

image.png

This would happen when your license key is either expired or blocked (usually due to an upgrade) and a replacement key was not provided that can cover the current version, and you have enabled the option to hide unlicensed features in our license key menu.

You will need to ensure that you have a currently valid license key for the Editor Plus or PDF-Xchange PRO in place, in order to access these functions. You can recover or renew your license at any time from your account page directly: https://www.pdf-xchange.com/login

Alternatively, you can uncheck this box:

image(1).png

And you will gain access to use these functions in evaluation mode for the time being (meaning demo stamps will be applied when saving a file after making use of these tools).

Beyond the option shown above, there are no circumstances where a license key will cause any of the tools on our main toolbar to be completely inaccessible. Any other cases of items being greyed out, are context sensitive actions.
For example, with a secured document, form field editing may be inaccessible and look like this:

image(2).png

The same kind of limitations appear when no PDF document is open for editing.

Kind regards,

[jeroen84]

Indeed, the Form Fields option is greyed out.

In the Installed License Keys box, it says I got a VALID, ACTIVATED key for PDF-XChange Edit. Altough it expired on 3 April 2024. I upgraded to my latest available version (10.2.1.3) this April 5th 2025. (I noticed I didn't upgrade for quite a while. )

The "Hide all licensed features" checkbox is not marked.

[Daniel - PDF-XChange]

Hello, jeroen84

A license for the "Editor" would not include the Form creation tools, you specifically need the "Editor Plus" to access them, however, that should not be able to cause what you are seeing.
The only time that tools in the Editor would be greyed out, as I mentioned before, is in context sensitive situations, such as when the document has password or signature security in place, preventing use of the form creation tools. Otherwise, even with the incorrect license, or no license at all, you would still be able to use these tools, just with the warning that "demo stamps" would be placed.

Can you please try resetting your application settings to the defaults. This is done via the "file" menu, under the "manage settings" category. After a full application settings reset, hopefully these tools become visible and you can continue with your day.

Kind regards,

[jeroen84]

I could still edit existing Forms with PDF-XChange Editor v9.

After resetting I now indeed see greyed out buttoms in the Form tab, and when I click on a button I get the DEMO stamps warning.

Ah, and now I've got the Select Fields button again to change Text Field properties. Thanks

[Daniel - PDF-XChange]

Hello, jeroen84

Glad to hear it helped. It sounds like somehow, despite the checkbox showing otherwise, the "hide unlicensed features" function was stuck enabled and the Reset was able to override it.

I will do some more testing on this end and see if I can reproduce the issue here, so we can try to prevent it in the future, but if you run into it again, please let me know.

Kind regards,