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Unable to Print or Save to PDF from Word on Mac

Anonymous
2022-11-10T16:59:46+00:00

Hello-

After the recent Mac OS upgrade to Ventura 13.0 I am unable to print to PDF or save as PDF from Word. This morning I applied the 13.0.1 upgrade as well, but am still running into this problem. Other coworkers who have upgraded the OS are not experiencing this issue, so I'm honestly not sure what's causing it.

If I try to print a document using Cmd+P, no dialogue appears. The same is true if I got to File and select the Print option from there. When I try to save the document as PDF, I get an error message stating the document cannot be saved. This occurs for any Word document, but does not occur with any other applications. I verified that there are no pending updates for Word (current version 16.66.1).

I searched through previous posts where users experienced this same problem and tried applying the solution to reset printer settings, which seemed to resolve this issue for most other users, but I cannot populate the option to reset when I get to that window (I've right-clicked/ctrl-clicked on everything). I do not have a physical printer.

Any help with this would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

Jessica

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For business | MacOS

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Anonymous
2022-12-13T22:14:34+00:00

I had this problem too (also using Mac 15.0.1) and also don't have a printer. So I added a random printer and it seemed to work just fine once again. Funny this is the only MS program I use anymore and the standard answer is still "uninstall and reinstall", even though that didn't work :)

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  1. Anonymous
    2022-12-13T22:30:16+00:00

    Thank you!! Adding a random printer worked; I can print to PDF again.

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  2. John Korchok 233K Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2022-11-10T17:27:02+00:00

    It's not uncommon that after updating an operating system, you need to reinstall applications to ensure they work correctly with the OS. Here are the steps to uninstall Office for Mac before reinstalling: Uninstall Office for Mac

    New operating systems often require new printer drivers. It's worth checking at the web site of your printer manufacturer for a Ventura driver for your model.

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  3. John Korchok 233K Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2022-11-11T19:49:50+00:00

    I misread your post title as saying you could print PDFs, but apparently you meant you couldn't print to PDF. You don't have any printers installed, so printing to PDF is not going to be an option. If you installed Adobe Acrobat (the full version), then you could print to Distiller (part of the Acrobat package).

    If you choose File>Print, there should be a PDF dropdown with an option to Save as PDF. Have you tried that?

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  4. Anonymous
    2022-11-11T19:18:28+00:00

    Thank you for your reply, John. I uninstalled all Office 365 apps, reinstalled, and rebooted, but I'm still having this issue when trying to print to PDF from Word. Since I do not have a physical printer, I don't believe the driver option will help me. Is there anything else you would recommend I try?

    Thanks again,

    Jessica

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