After Maverick, Safari will not download PDF files

Back up all data.

If Adobe Reader or Acrobat is installed, there should be a setting in its preferences such as Display PDF in Browser. I don't use those applications myself, so I can't be more precise. Deselect that setting, if it's selected. Otherwise do as follows.

Triple-click anywhere in the line of text below on this page to select it, the copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C:

/Library/Internet Plug-ins

In the Finder, select

Go ▹ Go to Folder

from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-G. Paste into the text box that opens (command-V), then press return.

From the folder that opens, remove any items that have "Adobe" or “PDF” in the name. You may be prompted for your login password. Then quit and relaunch Safari, and test.

The "Silverlight" web plugin distributed by Microsoft can also interfere with PDF display in Safari, so you may need to remove it as well, if it's present. The same goes for a plugin called "iGetter," and perhaps others.

If you still have the issue, repeat with this line:

~/Library/Internet Plug-ins

If you don’t like the results of this procedure, restore the items from the backup you made before you started. Relaunch Safari again.

Does this procedure turn off Adobe Reader in Safari.

Yes.

If so, what should I use in lieu of Adobe Reader?

The built-in PDF viewer.

I had the same problem and this solved it. Now PDFs open in Preview and save normally. Thank you!

I had the same problem, which was very frustrating because I have a work and a home computer both running Mavericks and it was only happening on the work computer.

The solution that finally worked for me was to open Preferences in Safari, go to the Security tab, and uncheck Allow plug ins. I am guessing that this disabled the Adobe plug-in which had been causing all the trouble. Since I don't have any other plug-ins, it wasn't a problem for me.

Thanks Linc Davis! Works for me. I should have known better than click yes to install that Acrobat thing. 🙂

Thanks, Linc. This worked, but now I can't open the PDFs in Safari. I went over to Adobe's website looking for help, and their wasn't any. You or anyone else have any ideas?

I have used Schubert|it's PDF Browser plugin for years (http://www.schubert-it.com/pluginpdf/), as it makes downloading easy, shows bookmarks in a sidebar, and allows users to navigate hyperlinks embedded in a PDF.

However, in Yosemite I needed to enable the plugin in Safari > Preferences > Security > Internet plug-ins: √ Allow Plug-ins. Website Settings...PDF Browser Plugin (choose sites to allow)

Similarly, you need to enable the Adobe PDF Viewer plugin that comes with Adobe Reader if you prefer to use that plugin. The plugins are located in /Library/Internet Plug-Ins/. To avoid conflicts you should only have one PDF viewer plugin installed here at a time, and discard old versions. Adobe's instructions explain the same thing: https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/using/display-pdf-browser-acrobat-xi.html

Thanks - this worked for me, although I do have other plug-ins, so instead of not allowing any plug-ins I just unchecked Adobe Reader plug-in.