Bookmarks – Failed

Bookmarks – Failed is a result from the Accessibility Checker in Adobe Acrobat Pro, in its Document category. Adobe's help says the check fails when a document has 21 or more pages but doesn't have bookmarks that follow the document's structure. Bookmarks are the clickable outline in a PDF's side panel that lets people jump straight to a section.

What this means

Acrobat's rule is simple: 21 or more pages and no bookmarks means a failure. It doesn't judge whether the bookmarks are any good. Useful bookmarks:

• mirror the heading outline, usually the top one or two heading levels;
• use the same words as the headings they point to;
• go to the right page, and nest subsections under their sections.

Shorter documents pass this rule automatically, but bookmarks still help in any document with several sections, such as an agenda packet or a policy manual.

Bookmarks and a linked table of contents do different jobs. A table of contents is part of the page, so people meet it once, in reading order. Bookmarks stay in the side panel, one click away from every page. Long documents, such as budgets and annual reports, benefit from both, and the table of contents entries should be real links to their sections.

Bookmarks are usually built from headings. If the headings are wrong, the bookmarks will be wrong too, so it's worth fixing heading levels first. See Appropriate nesting – Failed.

Why it matters

In a long PDF, bookmarks give people a way to jump to the section they need instead of paging through everything. That matters most for keyboard users, screen reader users and people with low vision who zoom in and can see only part of a page at a time. Bookmarks relate to WCAG 2.1 success criteria 2.4.1 Bypass Blocks and 2.4.5 Multiple Ways, and W3C's PDF techniques include creating bookmarks as a way to offer more than one way to find content.

How to fix it in Acrobat Pro

Fix it in the source file

Bookmarks made at export time update themselves with every new version of the document:

• Word: choose File > Save As > PDF, open Options and turn on Create bookmarks using: Headings. Word builds the bookmarks from the outline levels of your headings, so use the built-in heading styles.
• InDesign: in your table of contents settings, turn on Create PDF Bookmarks, and turn on Bookmarks when you export.
• Long reports from several files: combine the source files before exporting where you can, so one consistent set of headings produces one set of bookmarks.

Fix it automatically with Includoc

Includoc fixes this automatically. We create bookmarks from the document's headings, nested to match the outline.

Because bookmarks follow the headings, the part that needs a person is the outline itself. Our AI proposes heading levels, and you confirm them in the headings panel on the review screen. The bookmarks then follow the outline you approved.

Standards

Related errors

• Appropriate nesting – Failed: fix heading levels before generating bookmarks.
• Title – Failed: another document-level setting checked in the same Acrobat category.

For the full checklist, read How to make a PDF accessible, or check a PDF free to see whether your file needs bookmarks.