If you use Microsoft OneDrive and you're seeing this, open OneDrive and see if the issue goes away.
I was seeing this issue on a LOT of my PDF files and I was freaking out because these are my important files. When I opened a command prompt to look at the files with the DIR command I noticed that the "damaged" files had their file sizes in parentheses. I googled that and found that onedrive files that are not locally stored on the computer show their sizes in parentheses like this. So I opened
9 9 Upvotes 35 Replies 35 Community Expert ,/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446772#M15150 Jul 28, 2016 Jul 28, 2016
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That error message says it all. It's not a supported file type or if it is, it's corrupted.
Which program was used to create the file?
Nancy O'Shea— Product User, Community Expert & Moderator Community guidelinesBe kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446781#M15159 Jul 20, 2017 Jul 20, 2017
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MS Word (this problem just started happening today)
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Community Expert ,/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446782#M15160 Jul 20, 2017 Jul 20, 2017
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What file type was the original Word file?
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446783#M15161 Jul 20, 2017 Jul 20, 2017
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It is an original (typed be me) Word file .docx, I have also tried it saving the file as .doc
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446784#M15162 Jul 20, 2017 Jul 20, 2017
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The mistake is on me, sorry. Earlier I installed new software that also installed adobe 8. After removing, re-installing, shutting down, etc., it is now working.
Thank you for your assistance.
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446773#M15151 Jul 28, 2016 Jul 28, 2016
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How did you receive the file? Is it a pdf?
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Community Beginner ,/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446774#M15152 Jul 29, 2016 Jul 29, 2016
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Community Expert ,/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446776#M15154 Jul 29, 2016 Jul 29, 2016
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Contact the sender of that email and ask them why you cannot open it.
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Community Beginner ,/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446775#M15153 Jul 29, 2016 Jul 29, 2016
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it was a attachment in PDF format
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446777#M15155 Jul 29, 2016 Jul 29, 2016
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mikeh89040702 wrote: it was a attachment in PDF format |
Emailing a pdf file is the most common way to corrupt it. Some email clients will encode the pdf to make it smaller and therefore make the transfer faster but when it is unencoded at the other end, it corrupts. Have them either Zip it first or post it online and send you a link.
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Community Beginner ,/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446780#M15158 Jul 29, 2016 Jul 29, 2016
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446778#M15156 Jul 29, 2016 Jul 29, 2016
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You can "try" to save the pdf attachment first before opening it in Reader but most of the time, that doesn't make a difference. It will confirm that the file is being corrupted by the email though and not by some process involved in opening it from your email client.
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Community Beginner ,/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/8446779#M15157 Jul 29, 2016 Jul 29, 2016
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/13282636#M94965 Oct 20, 2022 Oct 20, 2022
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I received a pdf file from client and couldn't open it in Adobe Acrobat DC (Pro).I changed Compatibility and ran troubleshooting from the "right click-->Properties-->Compatibility tab and it didn't work. I managed to open it from either Edge and Chrome browser and save it as PDF instead, and now coudl open it. Dislikes the work around but at least I could open it now.
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Community Expert ,/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/13283073#M94970 Oct 20, 2022 Oct 20, 2022
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Ask the client which software & version they used to create the original PDF. It's possible they used another PDF creation tool that's incompatible with Acrobat.
Nancy O'Shea— Product User, Community Expert & Moderator Community guidelinesBe kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/11943687#M78354 Apr 02, 2021 Apr 02, 2021
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Way easier - go to cloudconvert.com -- works like magic
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/12115164#M80572 Jun 15, 2021 Jun 15, 2021
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I tried lots of other things, but this worked for me. I was able to open and repair the damaged PDF file by converting it to a "PDF". Thanks for sharing.
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/12214128#M81822 Jul 28, 2021 Jul 28, 2021
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How did you convert it if it didnt open?
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/12574279#M86296 Dec 06, 2021 Dec 06, 2021
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For me, I right click on the link to the PDF document I am trying to open, I selected the option to SAVE LINK AS>Save in my documents on my computer>Go to cloudconvert.com>Select File>And that worked for me.
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/12574280#M86297 Dec 06, 2021 Dec 06, 2021
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Genius, thanks for sharing.
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/t5/acrobat-reader-discussions/adobe-acrobat-reader-dc-could-not-open-because-it-is-either-not-a-supported-file-type-or-because-the/m-p/12972316#M91273 May 29, 2022 May 29, 2022
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If you use Microsoft OneDrive and you're seeing this, open OneDrive and see if the issue goes away.
I was seeing this issue on a LOT of my PDF files and I was freaking out because these are my important files. When I opened a command prompt to look at the files with the DIR command I noticed that the "damaged" files had their file sizes in parentheses. I googled that and found that onedrive files that are not locally stored on the computer show their sizes in parentheses like this. So I opened OneDrive and everything started working properly again. Onedrive usually runs all the time in the background so this process was stopped at some point and that's when the problem started. When I opened OneDrive manually then it started the process and all is well. I hope this helps some people!