Microsoft Edge is the default PDF reader and viewer in Windows 10. To open a PDF file, simply double-click on the respective file and Edge will quickly take over. Of course, this doesn’t mean you can’t use third-party tools to view PDFs. You just need to right-click on your PDF and select the tool you want to use to open it.
Or you can set that third-party PDF viewer as your default program. As a matter of fact, you may need to use a third-party program from time to time. This is because Edge may sometimes crash when opening PDF files.
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What to do if Edge Edge Crashes When Opening PDFs
1. Clear browsing history and cache
One way Edge (and all the other browsers out there) loads webpages fast is by saving temporary Internet files on your device. By clearing the cache, you can fix PDF display issues.
- Launch Microsoft Edge
- Go to History → Clear browsing data
- Select Browsing history, Cookies and other site data, and Cached images and files
- Hit the Clear now button.
You can also select all the boxes under Clear browsing data to make sure nothing’s interfering with Edge’s ability to open PDFs.
Note: You can uncheck the Passwords box if you don’t know all your passwords by heart or you forgot to write them down or save them somewhere.
2. Disable your extensions
Although this rarely happens, some of your extensions may interfere with the PDF files you’re trying to open on Edge.
Click on the menu, select Extensions, disable all of your extensions and check if the issue is gone.
If this is the case, enable your extensions one by one and test until you’ve found the culprit.
You can then either update the problematic extension or delete it if updating it didn’t solve the issue.
3. Reset your browser
If deleting your browser history, cache and the other files stored by the browser did not work, you can also reset Edge.
However, keep in mind this will reset your settings, meaning that your startup page, search engine, and pinned tabs will revert to default settings.
Your extensions will also be disabled. You favorites, history and saved passwords will still be there after you reset the browser.
- Launch Edge and click the menu
- Select Settings and then Reset settings from the left pane
- Select Restore settings to their default values
- Restart Edge and check if you can now open PDF files.
4. Reinstall Edge or use a third-party PDF viewer
If this PDF display problem is caused by corrupted browser files, reinstalling a fresh copy of Edge could solve the issue.
Go to Settings, open Apps & features, select Edge and hit the Uninstall button.
Or, you can simply install a PDF viewer such as Adobe Reader to get the job done quicker and view your PDF files.
Microsoft will NEVER fix this issue. It has been going on for years with no improvement. It is the last thing Microsoft cares about. Do not rely on Edge to read PDF files. Ever. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t work. Sometimes it will work near the top of the document but not the middle of the document. And even when it does work you cannot move the Read Aloud from one section of the document to another. If you try to do this, the entire thing just freezes. And when it does read, it grays out the rest of the document and only shows the word it is reading at the moment (that really took genius). You would think with all those $trillions the Microsoft executives stuff in their little pockets each year, they could afford a single programmer to fix this damn issue.
Resetting extensions fixed my problem. Thanks a lot