How to Create a Table of Contents From a PDF

Create a table of contents in Adobe Acrobat.

Using Adobe Acrobat, you can create an interactive table of contents from a PDF file, allowing you to click on link that will take to its corresponding page or section. In Acrobat, these links are called bookmarks and appear in the Bookmarks pane. You can use this to create a whole table of contents or just to bookmark a few pages that you want to jump to.

Things You'll Need

• Adobe Acrobat

Instructions

1. Open a PDF file in Adobe Acrobat. Scroll to the page where you want to create your first page in the Table of Contents.

2. Click the "Select" tool. Drag to select the title of the page. For example, if the table of contents has an entry for each chapter, drag to select the chapter title.

3. Click the "Bookmarks" button.

4. From the "Options" menu, select "New Bookmark."

5. Type or edit the name of the bookmark, perhaps the title of the first chapter.

6. Repeat these steps until you have complete all the entries in the table of contents.

Tips & Warnings

• If you have multilayered sections in your PDF file, try creating nested bookmarks for your table of contents. To do so, add a new bookmark to become the parent bookmark. Then, select the range of bookmarks to include under the parent bookmark. Drag the icons underneath the parent bookmark.

• It's important that you own the full version software of Adobe Acrobat. You cannot create bookmarks in the free Adobe Reader software. Creating bookmarks works in various versions of Acrobat, including Acrobat 7, 8 and 9.

References

• Adobe Acrobat 9 Help: About Bookmarks
• Adobe Acrobat 9 Help: Create a Bookmark
• Adobe Acrobat 9 Help: Create a Bookmark Hierarchy

Resources

• Planet PDF: Create a Bookmark Tree in Acrobat 7
• Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional Help: Create a Bookmark