What to do When You Cannot Find 'Microsoft Print to PDF' Option When Trying to Print to PDF

Sometimes you’ll come across Windows 11 computers that do not have the very handy “Microsoft Print to PDF” option in the list of printers to select. This option is very handy to save files as PDF and to split big PPDF by individual pages. Here are the steps you could try to get that option back and working.¹²

1. Go to the search button on Windows, search for “Windows Features” and check under “Turn Windows on or off” box if “Microsoft Print to PDF” is turned off. If turned off, turn it on, and you’re good to go. If it’s turned on and still you do not see “Microsoft Print to PDF option, proceed below.
2. Open Command Prompt as an admministrator and run the following:

net stop wuauserv
net stop bits
net stop cryptsvc

ren C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution SoftwareDistribution.old
ren C:\Windows\System32\catroot2 catroot2.old

If you get “Access denied when running the two last commands, run the top three commands again.

net start wuauserv
net start bits
net start cryptsvc

DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
sfc /scannow

The above two commands WILL take time. Prepare to wait.

3. Reboot, open Command Prompt as admin and:

DISM /Online /Enable-Feature /FeatureName:"Printing-PrintToPDFServices-Features" /All

4. Check if “Microsoft Print to PDF” is now available when using a PDF Reader (say Foxit).

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