Adobe Reviews 

I attempted to download adobe creative cloud for my college courses, used my school email to sign up, and even saved money on monthly payments due to a limited-time offer for students. I wasn't able to access creative cloud because it wouldn't download, and when I checked the apps that I was SUPPOSED to be able to use, I didn't have the ability to use any of them. I went back to the home page to cancel my subscription, but rather than giving me any compensation for the money I lost, they charged me even MORE just so I could cancel the plan.
This is not a good way to treat customers, and I'm still shocked that people use adobe at all. 50 dollars down the drain, and an extra 25 as the student plan is not available anymore.

Adobe used to be amazing, but lately, their software literally acts like malware and is incredibly invasive. I do not recommend anyone download it to their system anymore.

I am documenting here a long-running and fully documented case with Adobe.
The matter concerns perpetual licences for Adobe Acrobat XI Pro that I purchased and paid for in full. I assert rights under four purchased perpetual licences. These were not subscriptions or time-limited licences.
The problem arose when the software needed to be installed and activated again on other/new computers.
Adobe has confirmed to me in writing that the former activation infrastructure for Acrobat XI has been taken out of service and that the current Adobe support team is unable to reset or release the corresponding legacy activations.
What I find particularly concerning is Adobe's current explanation.
On 29 September 2026, Adobe informed me in writing that for one serial number it checked, its system merely shows the status “Activation Limit Reached.”
At the same time, Adobe expressly confirmed that it can no longer provide the individual historical activation records, cannot provide the activation dates, cannot identify the specific computers or devices concerned, and cannot determine whether previous activations are still associated with devices that even exist today.
In other words, Adobe shows “Activation Limit Reached” for the serial number it checked, but cannot provide me with verifiable evidence showing which specific activations caused that status, when they occurred, or on which devices they exist or previously existed.
There is another important point.
Adobe has also informed me in writing that the relevant licence agreement contains no single clause expressly stating that Adobe may shut down the activation server after a certain number of years.
Adobe nevertheless takes the position that a perpetual licence concerns the duration of the usage right but does not necessarily require Adobe to maintain the associated technical infrastructure indefinitely.
As a customer, I find the practical consequence of this extremely problematic.
I purchased and fully paid for perpetual software licences. I am not asking Adobe for free updates, new functionality or unlimited technical support.
I am asking to be able to continue exercising the perpetual usage rights that I paid for.
Adobe offered me an Acrobat 2024 licence valid for only three years. I expressly rejected that offer. In my view, a licence that expires after three years is not an equivalent replacement for perpetual usage rights that were purchased and paid for.
I have therefore requested that Adobe either restore the usability of my four purchased perpetual licence rights or provide four equivalent, currently activatable perpetual replacement licences at no additional cost.
No corresponding perpetual replacement solution has been provided to me so far.
The matter is therefore now being escalated for legal review.
All material factual statements in this review are supported by my written correspondence with Adobe and by the available purchase and licensing documentation.
If Trustpilot requires evidence to verify this genuine customer experience or any of the statements made above, I am prepared to provide the relevant documentation directly to Trustpilot.
I will update this review if Adobe provides an appropriate solution or if the factual situation changes.

Adobe is one of the worst companies we have ever dealt with and we deal with some of the largest companies in the world. Please find an alternative comany to deal with

I needed help transferring files from my old student account to my personal account, bear in mind i graduated last year so was coming to it a bit late. Initially i struggled to figure out how to do this because the only help offered from adobe is through their community page, which didn't have the answers i needed. Then i spoke to the chat bot which was absolutely useless, only understands very simple problems explained with easy words. Well i wouldn't be using the chat bot if i had a simple problem to fix would i?? Anyway, i found a number online for the adobe support team and spoke to someone within minutes. He was amazing, explained how he was going to fix my problem and was very efficient. I needed access to my old student email to approve the data migration of my files but i didn't have this, so on the adobe agents advice rang my uni to check with them, then rang adobe back to explain i wasn't going to be able to approve the data migration through the email, as its been shut down. I spoke to an amazing woman, whose name i didn't catch unfortunately, who explained that i might not be able to do the transfer unless i had access to the email but she said leave it with me. Anyway after lots of silence about 40 mins, she only went and bloody sorted it for me!!!!! 215GB of photos transferred to my new account and approved through my new email not my student one. She genuinely saved me not sure what i would have done if i wasn't able to get those files back. Anyway, despite adobe sort of having cut off any contact with their customers, which makes trouble shooting issues virtually impossible, once i was able to get hold of someone she was exceptional!!!

Worst ever, takes yours files hostage! i hope they go broke!!

Dear Sir or Madam,

Subject: FINAL NOTICE – Formal Notice Before Referral to the Competent Authorities

I am writing to you by way of a formal notice regarding the refund owed to me, which you have repeatedly stated has been issued since July.

For several months, you have maintained that a refund in my favour was processed. However, to date, I have received no funds and you have failed to provide any verifiable banking evidence demonstrating that the refund was actually completed.

More seriously, you claimed that my bank had rejected a transfer originating from your company. This statement has been formally disputed by my bank, which I contacted directly. No concrete evidence has been provided to substantiate the alleged rejection.

I have contacted you repeatedly through several channels in an attempt to resolve this matter. Despite this, I have received different explanations on different occasions, some of which have been contradictory. I consider that sufficient time has now been given to resolve this matter amicably.

I also remind you that the applicable rules concerning refunds following a cancellation and/or withdrawal provide, subject to the circumstances and applicable legal conditions, for a statutory period of 14 days. In any event, this period has been exceeded by a considerable margin.

Accordingly, I hereby formally demand that you process the full refund owed to me without any further delay, and that you provide me with verifiable proof of execution together with the transaction reference required to trace the payment.

This email constitutes my final amicable notice.

Should I not receive the funds by the beginning of next week at the latest, I will, without further notice, take any steps I consider necessary to enforce my rights, including referring the matter to the competent authorities, consumer protection bodies and relevant regulatory institutions in France, Ireland and, where applicable, any other Member State of the European Union concerned.

I also reserve the right to provide the competent authorities and relevant bodies with the complete record of our communications, your various responses and the information provided by my bank.

I therefore expect you to treat this matter with the utmost seriousness and to resolve it immediately and definitively.

Failing this, I will consider that you have been duly placed on formal notice and will proceed with the necessary steps without further notification.

Yours faithfully,

Absolutely unacceptable for professional workflows. I paid for a premium subscription with 'Unlimited access' and have 8,570 credits left, but Adobe's broken server infrastructure has completely locked me out. For days, the app shows 'Slow down. For security reasons...' and the web browser throws 'Something went wrong' on every single generation using partner models (Gemini). Reddit is full of users facing the exact same infrastructure issue right now. Adobe is aggressively running ads to climb the App Store charts, but their backend is completely overloaded and falsely bans legitimate paying customers while customer support is completely useless. Do not buy if you have commercial deadlines

I brought Photoshop Elements 2026. I have never come across a program so poor. You can literally put the kettle on while waiting for the program to respond. I went onto their help guides which are no help at all. So I went onto the chat help. After being passed around from the likes of Razavi and Erra, I got NO HELP. So I spent approx £80 for a program that is not for for use. From a company who use to have a good reputation to being a company who puts out poor apps for large money

I started with Adobe in 1987 betas. Loved it. Assisted at MacWorld expos often knowing the products more than the employees. It was my pleasure. Why do you ask about my experience? You have not shown any desire to help. And why transition to a 'rental' plan where I lose all my files if I discontinue my subscription? Free money? I paid to create those files and everything I created was in InDesign. I am now 84 and ailing. No way to afford $75/mo. software. But without it I cannot open any of my files from the last 20+ years and that includes all of my health files that my doctors would like to see. All of those precious files I created with my grandchildren. This is not true of any other software on my computer. I paid, I created files and I can refer to them and share them at will. But not anything I created in Adobe. Your greed is incomprehensible.

I hate you, I just wasted 3 hours of my life trying to editor on your TRASH editing software... I would rather get a 8 inch banana forced down my throat than ever touch adobe after effects again.

Customer service are not helpful at all. They are scamming their customers to make them pay even though they want to cancel the subscription

I was trapped. I was offered to download 1 photo free. Then, they trapped me into an annual subscription without my consent. I cancelled my subscription, which I did not mean to buy in the first place, and I was charged for the whole year. Are you making money by trapping people like this, Adobe? How can I ask for my refund of the full year subscription?

Absolute SCAM. They swindle you into paying for a full year even if you select monthly payments. On top of that, if you try to cancel they charge $150. It then automatically renews AGAIN after the full year is payed. I’ve been trying to cancel this subscription for 2 years and I don’t want to know how much money I’ve poured into an inactive account. Unbelievable that this professional company is SCAMMING its customers

Misleading business practices, the world leader in Dark pattern user interfaces, Deceptive and misleading pricing structures, gaslighting AI driven support responses designed to obfuscate and confuse.

Adobe now has a ridiculous account access app, without which it is impossible to sign in to access the services which you’ve paid for. If you’ve forgotten your password, you are unable to access either Adobe or Adobe Account Access, and consequently are unable to put in any of the endless codes which you are required to put into either one, as a result of which you are unable to use the software you’ve paid for at all. It seems to be impossible to speak to a person at Adobe about this. Despite cancelling both my monthly payments to Adobe, the company still managed to continue taking money from my PayPal account. This is something very close to theft.

Cancelled subscription straight after I started a free trial turns out I didn't need it.
Got a confirmation email that it would end on the 10th but they tried to change my €36.89 on the 19th.

So they wanted to to pay for the free trial after it ended even though I cancelled it straight away.

I have to update my payment details to cancel.....

SORT IT OUT NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I would give this zero if I could.

I have just wasted two hours trying to get a trial version of Adobe Pro to work; and when I tried to cancel the trial I got a "Oops - something went wrong" message. Apparently they're experiencing an 'outage' which is why they can't do anything. AWFUL PRODUCT EXPERIENCE. AWFUL CUSTOMER SERVICE EXPERIENCE. AVOID

I had two separate Adobe subscriptions being charged at the same time, and when I contacted support to get the issue resolved, it was unnecessarily difficult. I brought up the refund multiple times, but the representative kept glossing over it and seemed more focused on explaining why I had two subscriptions and trying to keep them active.

Eventually, they refunded only one month, even though the charges went back much farther. When I asked again about the older charges, I was told their system could only refund one month and that I should contact my bank instead. Only after continuing to push did they agree to keep the case open and review the full billing history.

I understand Adobe Express and Acrobat Pro are technically different subscriptions, but I did not knowingly intend to maintain and pay for both at the same time. The entire experience made something that should have been simple incredibly frustrating.

I’m cancelling my remaining Adobe subscription and switching to another service. I’d rather pay a company with better customer service.