You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!

When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

Apple Books PDF notes disappearing

I have a PDF book imported in my Apple Book app on iPad. While reading it, I had some highlights and took notes there.


Then I clicked "Share PDF" and opened the PDF in another app Nebo. Surprisingly I found that while the highlights are still there, all notes are missing!


Then I went back to the Book app and cannot see the notes as well!


How can I fix it?



iPad Air, iPadOS 14

Posted on Nov 2, 2021 10:57 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Nov 2, 2021 11:00 PM

Luckily I found out a fix. Steps are:


1) airdrop the PDF to my macbook

2) open the PDF with Adobe Acrobat Reader (Important: the built-in Preview app won't work!). Now I see a blue banner saying it's in read-only mode.

3) Click on the button inside the banner to enable write on the PDF.

4) Save the PDF and airdrop back to Books on iPad.

5) Open the PDF on iPad and see the notes coming back.

1 reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Nov 2, 2021 11:00 PM in response to Smillence

Luckily I found out a fix. Steps are:


1) airdrop the PDF to my macbook

2) open the PDF with Adobe Acrobat Reader (Important: the built-in Preview app won't work!). Now I see a blue banner saying it's in read-only mode.

3) Click on the button inside the banner to enable write on the PDF.

4) Save the PDF and airdrop back to Books on iPad.

5) Open the PDF on iPad and see the notes coming back.

Apple Books PDF notes disappearing

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.