PDF Highlights and Notes In Preview

You can use Preview to study or for research with its simple highlighting tool. You can highlight in several colors and see a list of all of the text you have marked. You can also add notes through the document.

Comments: 15 Responses to “PDF Highlights and Notes In Preview”

    robert Sigafoos
    6 years ago

    Is it possible to make the highlight color lighter or are we stuck with dark color? Can not find anything in the preferences. Maybe something in terminal app?

    6 years ago

    robert: You are stuck with those colors. If you need more advanced settings, there are of third-party apps that can be used for marking up PDFs.

    Robert Sigafoos
    6 years ago

    Just discovered that you can use the Control key to select the different colors.

    Robert
    6 years ago

    Hi Gary!
    Is there anyway to make the high lite lighter? I find the colours quite dark.
    Thanks in advance!
    Robert

    Robert
    6 years ago

    Sorry, Gary! Didn’t notice that the question of dark high lites was asked.
    Robert

    Ken
    6 years ago

    Hi Gary,
    I tried using highlighter before and it never worked. Then I discovered that the "PDF" i put there weren't PDF they were jpeg (which you can't Highlight). These items I put there using a scanner. Is there any way to get a document (from a scanner) to a PDF format in preview.

    Thanks
    Ken

    6 years ago

    Ken: You can choose JPG or PDF when doing a scan. But even if you choose PDF it will just be a PDF with an image inside it, not the actual text. The actual text needs to be there for highlighting to work. That happens when you get the document as a pure PDF, such an an online form or a "printed" webpage.

    Narelle
    6 years ago

    Hi Gary,
    Is there something similar in Pages? (apart from FIND)
    Sometimes i copy a pdf & past into pages and edit a pdf into there (to make it small, more concise, or change the font/spacing etc)

    6 years ago

    Narelle: What are you trying to do, exactly? In Pages you can change the color of characters, and also the background color of characters. It is all in the Style sidebar. To change the background color, click the gear-icon to the right of the Underline button.

    Steve
    6 years ago

    How do I highlight one colour over another in preview? For example, if I have an existing yellow text highlighted, I want to go over in pink to create orange. Right now, when I highlight over the yellow with pink it turns pink. I want it to turn orange.

    6 years ago

    Steve: You simply can't do that. Just highlight some of it yellow, some of it orange, and some of it pink.

    Steve
    6 years ago

    I have done it many times before. I'm just surprised it hasn't worked this time. Ok. Could you tell me how I get an orange colour then? It just gives me options for yellow, pink green, blue and purple. Thanks.

    6 years ago

    Steve: Oh, sorry, I didn't look the colors available before responding. You'll just have to use the colors that are available. But perhaps if I could understand WHY you needed to do this, maybe I can suggest something better?

    Steve
    6 years ago

    I am using different colours for student report cards. In the past when I've done this the pink over yellow would turn it orange. It helps students/parents see progress made by a student term over term. For some reason, it's not letting me create one layer over another.

    6 years ago

    Steve: I don't recall Preview's highlighting function ever mixing colors like that. Perhaps you were thinking of another PDF app or some other app entirely? I tried it in other apps, and PDFPen Pro does it.

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