Acrobat Properties Bar for Quick Access to Text Color Highlights

I recently received an email about using the Text Highlighter tool in Acrobat:

_I enjoy your articles on using Adobe. One item I use very often is the Text Highlighter tool. I mark text in different colors depending on the substance of the text itself. To do so, I mark the text in question and then open the Properties Box and then select the color I need.

This can be very time consuming as I am constantly switching back and forth on the colors. I was wondering, is there is a faster way to select a different color?_

Mark E. Schell
Senior Vice President and General Counsel
Unit Corporation

At first I was stumped, but then I remembered the solution!

The Properties Bar in Acrobat which offers quick access to many tool options.

Read on to learn about using the Properties Bar to quickly change text highlight colors.

Showing the Properties Toolbar

To show the Properties Toolbar, try one of the following:

• Right-click in a free area the Acrobat toolbar and choose Properties Bar
• 
• View—>Toolbars—> Properties Bar
• Use a keyboard command
  WIN: Ctrl-E
  MAC: CMD-E

The Properties Bar appears:

Not much to look at!

However, this toolbar is context sensitive. The Properties Bar will offer different options depending on what is selected in your Acrobat document.

Docking the Properties Bar

Since the Properties Bar lets you quickly get to many tool options, I recommend docking it for quick access:

Quit Acrobat to make the toolbar settings “sticky” for future Acrobat sessions.

Using the Properties Bar for Quick Access to Text Color Highlights

Once docked, the Properties Bar will show available options. To use it for quick text highlights, do this:

1. Open a PDF document
2. Choose View—>Toolbars—> Comment and Markup
3. Select the Highlight Text tool
4. 
5. The Properties Bar changes to reflect options available
6. 
7. Choose the color needed for the text highlight, then select text on the document.

This tip allows you to quickly use a lot of colors… maybe even too many!

Use the Properties Bar

The Properties Bar allows you to quickly change the properties in Acrobat annotations, including a few which might not immediately come to mind…

• Color, Style and Size of a font within a sticky note
• 
• Font, size, color and style of text within a Text Box annotation
• 
• Easily edit form field options such as font, border, etc.
• Change bookmark colors and links

Once you dock the Properties Bar, many new options will quickly become apparent.