Adobe launches Acrobat-based Student Spaces, a free AI-powered study tool for students

Adobe Acrobat has largely served the professionals with its modern AI features. Now, the company is turning its attention to students by making Acrobat even more useful with the launch of a new AI tool called Student Spaces. The tool will allow students to create presentations, flashcards, and quizzes from study materials such as PDF files, links, and notes.

With the launch, the creative group company is trying to compete with other AI tools like Google NotebookLM, Goodnotes and Turbo AI, all of which allow students to upload documents to create different types of study materials. To get even more attention, Adobe is making Adobe Student Spaces free, and hosting it at a separate URL. Additionally, users can start using Student Spaces without logging in.

To use Spaces, students can upload all types of documents, including PDFs, Docs, PowerPoint, Excel, URLs, handwritten notes, and text files, and then create various study materials, such as flashcards, mind maps, quizzes, podcasts, and editable presentations powered by Adobe Express. They can also create study guides and maps to chart their way through the course.

The company previously added the ability to create two-person AI podcasts from documents in Acrobat last month. This feature now extends to the student tool, allowing users to listen to the topics they are studying.

Students can also access a chat option to ask questions to the AI-powered assistant. Adobe said Assistant relies on its knowledge of uploaded documents to reduce the possibility of error. The company indicated that it developed the product by testing it with 500 students and different student groups from universities such as Harvard, Berkeley, and Brown.

Charlie Miller, vice president of education at Adobe, told TechCrunch over a phone call that while there are existing tools for studying, Adobe wants to create a one-stop-shop for students to read and create materials.

“Students have already started using Acrobat to consume these documents and read all of their course materials. And the thing that we’ve heard over and over again, is that they love this as a one-stop shop or study center. And when they actually open Acrobat to read those PDFs, they can just hit create flashcards, or they can just create a study space. Plus, I think not having to keep moving documents around, is one of the big differentiators.”

The story has been updated to reflect the name of the tool, Student Spaces.