My solution involves Applescript. Read below if you use Mac and are interested in using Sripts to solve this issue.

Okay so it appears that the admin on this thread is not understanding the point of the topic.
The point is not which settings are selected! That is not the point!

The point is that we want to have our own custom pdf preset be the one that is automatically selected when we go to save a pdf. I know it sounds like a stupid nitpick to have to use your mouse to go to the dropdown menu and change the preset to your own preset. It's only a second or 2 extra, but like many people have said on this forum; when you have to do this dozens of times a day or even a hundred times a day it gets very frustrating! It would be so much easier for your preset to automatically be selected when you are about to save a pdf and all you have to do is hit enter. That's the dream. We designers are obsessed with automation!

So Illustrator has failed us and they don't seem to understand what it is we even want. Now what?
My solution has been to go around this issue by creating a script. For anyone who is unfamiliar with Scripts, Script is kind of like code that you can write in your operating system that has the ability to control certain functions in your computer or applications, such as Illustrator. Enough mumbo jumbo, I created a script to use in illustrator which allows me to bypass the pdf prompts and options! I just created a pdf preset that fits my needs and saved it. Obviously it isn't the default, which is the problem. So my script takes care of that. If you need help understanding how to apply a script just look around online. It's not as hard as it seems. Anyway if anyone wants to dabble in the world of applescripting and solve this issue, the script code will be pasted below. Just replace the text within the quotation marks in the section "Your Preset Name Here" with the name of YOUR pdf preset. Copy all text between the colon at the end of this paragraph and the paragraph marked Summary. Script below:

set targetFolder to choose folder
set targetPath to targetFolder as string

tell application "Adobe Illustrator"

set user interaction level to never interact

set documenti to current document

set documentCount to documenti

set documentName to name of documenti

save documenti in file (targetPath & documentName) as pdf with options {class:PDF save options, PDF preset:"Your Preset Name Here"}

end tell

Summary
That is all you will need to make the system do what you need it to do. Now it's up to you to figure out how to apply it and automate it using illustrator actions to maximize efficiency in your pdf saving workflow. This is not the perfect solution but it is what I have used to get around this issue due to Adobe's incompetence or lack of understanding on this subject. It is not the perfect solution! I still have a few bugs I encounter sometimes and I derived this script from one I found online and made some changes for it to function better and worked out a few bugs. It is imperfect, but in some ways, it is even better than what I imagine would be Adobe's solution. Just a matter of taking it and working with it till you get what you want out of it. Good luck!

I would like this! I think Doug is referring to what I would LOVE... which is when creating a document in .ai format, for local print company print-ready files, they require a PDF, I have a preset that adds crop marks, etc. I "Save a copy..." for this purpose MANY MANY times a week. This would be HUGE if Adobe could setup to allow me to choose what is the default PDF preset that appears in the final PDF dialog box when saving.

What would save us all a LOT of time would be a "FAST PDF" proof based on active artboard.... i.e., you click on PDF symbol in the toolbox and ai uses default pdf setting and save as pdf loads and automatically gives you the save to menu to desktop (letting you assign a name or just hit return). This would be the best case scenario, as a stop-gap If someone here can write a script to do this, please post a response here (with a command-shift-something this would also save a ton of time)

Anonymous: you probably work in a relaxed, controlled environment - many of us don't have that luxury. In any given day I may have to create as many as 100+ pdf PROOFS to send to clients. That's not an exaggeration. Life would be easier if there was a "quick save to pdf" or the ability to have a preset AUTOMATICALLY loaded for pdfs. ALL my clients only need a low res pdf as a proof, but the default is an insane config that saves a file that is up to 3X bigger than the combined components in the file. Way back when Pagemaker had a fast "save this page as pdf" button, that would be ideal. But if not that we want to config the default "save page as" so we can just save a pdf and move on and not have to pull down menus. And no we are not crying about something small, if you worked in a fast paced high stress world you'd see the benefit of saving time on EVERY single job. Plus there's the times where you're in a hurry and pull down to the wrong setting and hit SAVE and have to redo it.

I am not sure i understand this right... but perhaps you are talking about saving custom Adobe pdf presets?
If yes it's pretty simple: when "saving as pdf" dialog is open you have the default presets menu that are impossible or hard to change permanently, but after you manually edit a preset you just press that little "download" icon on the right of the menus and it will open a dialog for saving your CUSTOM PRESET - name it and save it and it will stay there as one of the presets.
P.S. in order to delete (a custom) preset go to Edit->Adobe pdf presets (choose and delete using the trash bin icon)

If you guys talking about changing the default presets - yes it could be useful if at least it DIDN'T APPEAR ON TOP OF THE LIST of the presets, because hey - no one is using that "illustrator default" preset, you have created an app for designers, maybe you should check with them what's the most common preset used, and still not to have it appear on top of the list because it's quite annoying.
p.p.s and can we find a way to bypass the annoying additional dialog when saving .ai file as another .ai file? really, no one ever touches that one either, so many many useless clicks happen in the universe.

It seems by Neeraj's reply that they expect us to save/open/edit/save in PDF instead of using illustrator's own native file format.

PDF is not and never was intended to be an editable file format. It is an end-use format. Saving your illustrator data as "private data" within the PDF is, quite frankly, idiotic.

Running an "illustrator default / illustrator editing capabilities ON" PDF through preflight (PDFtoolbox or the like) and changing anything about the file completely destroys the link between the preflighted PDF data and the private data (opening the PDF in illustrator afterwards will *NOT* show you the changes the preflight made to the file)

Do yourselves a favor and just turn it off. I would say "and leave it off" but since it defaults to being ON and we're unable to select a default... well, that's what this feature request is about.

I want to add my voice to this as well. Definitely agree! It's simply ridiculous that this doesn't exist yet. It would save designers a ton of time. Every little adds up.

The Adobe Illustrator Team obviously does not understand what this request is asking for, re "Changing default PDF preset". HINT: the clue is in the words "default" and "preset".

When creating a new Illustrator document, saving that, and THEN saving as an Illustrator PDF (eg to send to a printer), the problem is that the default PDF setting is ALWAYS "illustrator default".

We are asking for a way to set the DEFAULT PDF setting (when saving as from an illustrator document), to be x:1a or x:4 or whatever (eg a Custom setting to save marks and bleed as well).

This has been a feature in, say, Coreldraw, for years - you can create a PDF from the design file, with preset PDF settings, in basically one click. No faffing about with having to reselect or adjust from a very basic factory default.

Thanks for your response.

The first case is pretty clear, and no change is expected in that workflow.

For the second one, the case I wanted to highlight can be explained with these: Create a new document, draw something and save it as a PDF (with Illustrator Editing Capabilities). Pick Compatibility as Acrobat 3 (PDF 1.3). Give the PDF a name (say A.pdf), and close the file.

Create a new document, same steps, but this time pick Compatibility as Acrobat 8 (PDF 1.7). Save and close the file. Say B.pdf

So in both cases different Compatibility options were used. Now, when we open A.pdf and do a Save As (PDF) - the PDF options dialog shows Acrobat 3 for compatibility - as the default starting point. And B.pdf will show Acrobat 8 for compatibility. This is because the PDF compatibility information gets embedded in the file itself.

We can surely change the current behavior such that when A.pdf is opened and Save As (PDF) it performed, Acrobat 8 compatibility is shown in the dialog (as that was the last used option). But, this change will deprive the users to know which compatibility version (and other settings) were embedded in the PDF they opened. It is also possible that there could be certain workflows based on this info - those would be affected too.

One more thing to consider here is that Save / SaveAs PDF with Illustrator Editing Capabilities ON is a completely different file, than those saved with Illustrator Editing Capabilities OFF. What I described above is only related to PDFs saved with Illustrator Editing Capabilities ON.

Generating PDFs from InDesign is an export workflow, and does not have such challenges.

Question - Would providing 'File > Export > PDF' and then making the options of that dialog persistent, make a better story, that changing what is working now.

Look forward to your feedback. Thanks!

Neeraj, thanks for the note. I'm not exactly sure what you're asking, but I'll take my best guess:

1. I think so. I just ran through these steps: I saved an Illustrator file as a PDF (with AI editing capabilites), closed it, opened it again, made some edits, and pressed Cmd+S. The file opened immediately in Acrobat (as it should), so I was not able to see if the PDF settings had changed. But this part is not the issue.

2. Correct, but again, this is not the issue.

What I'm requesting is that Illustrator handle PDF presets the same way InDesign does. In InDesign, no matter what setting I use to export (save) a PDF, InDesign remembers it. Do I want to save the INDD PDF using the High Quality Print setting? Press Quality? Smallest File Size? Doesn't matter what I choose, the next time I export a file, INDD remembers my PDF setting. Its default is the last setting I chose. That's easiest for the user, and it really shouldn't be hard from a coding standpoint.

Conversely, when saving a PDF in Illustrator, Illustrator always reverts to the very same PDF preset, "[Illustrator Default]", which creates a PDF file the size of Canada. I've saved thousands of PDFs in my decades of using Illy, and I have to change this setting every single time. That's unnecessary.

Let me know if you need further clarification. Thanks.

There are a couple of considerations to be made here:

1. When you save/close a PDF (with Ai editing capabilities), open it back, make some edits and press Cmd+S (Save), original PDF settings are preserved. I am assuming there are no expectations of changing this behavior.

2. Same document, when Saved As (copy), the PDF options dialog picks up the settings embedded in the PDF as the starting point. Users can then change it. By showing user's last used setting (as requested in this report), it would not be possible to populate PDF's embedded setting in the dialog.

Please share if this is an acceptable change.

I want to add my voice to this as well. Definitely agree! It's amazing that this doesn't exist yet. It would save designers a ton of time. Every little adds up.

we have 6 designers in the company who do exactly that same thing multiple times EVERY SINGLE DAY. Please adobe. :D

I 100% agree.

In the past it seems recording an action to save to your desktop remembered the last preset used, but this often got corrupted, so cannot gaurantee this will work on all .ai verions. Our need is to make sure there is no color conversion, so the printer can review spot plates correctly.

I second this!!