Welcome > PDF Editing > Forms > Create and edit form fields

Create and edit form fields

You can create and edit form fields. A form field can be drawn anywhere on the PDF page. You can resize or delete a single form field or multiple form fields simultaneously. See Form Controls for the range of field types.

Important Do not edit form controls or run Form Typer on a form with active XFA controls.

Create a form field

  1. Open the Forms ribbon and select the desired tool from the Form Elements group.
  2. Drag the cursor to create a form field of the required size.
  3. The relevant form field properties dialog box appears.
  4. Select desired properties and click Close.

Define properties for form fields

  1. Select the form tool for the field type involved and double click the control.

    The multi-tab properties dialog box appears.

  2. Update the settings applying to all form field types, such as Field Name, Hover Text and various field display attributes.

    Make the control visible or invisible, printable or not, read-only or not and in some cases required or not.

  3. Update the settings depending on the field type:
    1. Check boxes – Check box style, export values, default state and associated actions.
    2. Radio Buttons – Same as check box, but additionally the ability to set that all buttons with identical names and values form a group.
    3. Text Fields – Text alignment, default text to display (if any).

    Text fields settings on the Format page must conform to the rules for chosen format:

    • None – No restrictions.

    • Number – Select separator style, number of decimals, negative number display method or percentage display, and whether the field is for monetary values (if so, which currency and which punctuation for separators).

    • Date or Time – Select a format template from the list.

    • Special formats – Select Special, select General in the list, then select Zip Codes with 5 or 9-digits, telephone numbers or US social security numbers.

    • Arbitrary Mask – Define your own pattern (see Searching by Patterns and Masks).

    • Custom – Define your own form field content rules.

    Note For text fields with no restriction, you can allow a multi-line field with or without text scrolling. 'Password' allows the real value to be replaced with a set of asterisks. You may select Allow Rich Text Formatting to enable the Text Field Format ribbon while editing the field content.
    Note You can set requirements for validation of field content entered by recipients, and set up rules for automatic calculation of values in selected numerical fields.
  4. Digital signature field – Linked actions and rules for signing.
  5. List Box – Define the list texts and their export values and associate actions to triggers or selection changes.
  6. Combo Box – As for list box, but also with the format choices available for Text fields. The list box entries must conform to limitations of the format.

Resize one or more form fields

Select the one or more form fields you want to resize before proceeding with the steps below.
  • To resize the fields by dragging, select the form tool that was used to create the form field, and then drag any border handle on the field. Press and hold the Shift key to keep the current field’s aspect ratio.
  • To resize the fields by one pixel, press the Ctrl + Arrow key; to resize the fields by 10 pixels, press Ctrl + Shift + Arrow.
  • To resize a group of form fields to have the same width, height, or area of a particular form field, select the fields to be changed; then right-click over the field that has the dimension you want and select Height, Width, or Both under Size in the context menu.

Propagate form controls over multiple pages

It is possible to virtually copy a form control object onto every page, without manually copy and paste it.

  1. Right-click on the object.

    The context menu appears.

  2. Select Clone on each page in the shortcut menu.

Delete a form field

  1. To delete a form field, then proceed with any of the steps below.

    • Right-click a field and select Edit > Delete from the shortcut menu.

    • Select the field, then press Delete.

Clear all form fields


  1. Reset Fields icon
    To clear all form fields click the Forms > Fields > Reset Fields tool.

Specify in which order users can tab through the fields in a form


  1. Set Tab Order icon
    Select tool at Forms > Fields > Set Tab Order.

    Sorts the fields according to their creation order by default: a number appears in the top-left corner of each form field to signal its current position.

  2. To change this tab order:
    1. Double-click the field that you want to be the first.

      Numbering changes accordingly.

    2. Single-click the rest of the fields as you want them ordered.
    3. Click the Hand tool to stop re-ordering. If you stop before all fields are clicked, the remaining fields keep the ordering as displayed.

Note You can set standardized tab orders. Display Pages in the Panel area, right-click a page and select Page Properties. Select the preferred option in the Tab Order page.