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Turn on or off live preflight
Last updated on
Jun 2, 2026
Learn how to use the Preflight panel or document menu to toggle live error checking for Adobe InDesign documents.
Live preflight automatically monitors your InDesign document for potential production issues as you work. When enabled, InDesign displays a green or red circle icon in the status bar at the end of the document window. Green indicates no errors have been detected, while red indicates issues requiring attention.
Control preflight for the active document
Select Window > Output > Preflight to open the Preflight panel.
Select the On checkbox in the upper-left corner of the Preflight panel to turn on live preflight for this document.
When you turn on preflight, InDesign immediately checks the document against the active preflight profile and displays any detected errors in the panel. The status bar icon updates to reflect the current state.
Tip
You can also turn off preflight by selecting the down arrow icon at the bottom of the document window beside the green or red circle icon, then select Preflight Document from the menu.
Set the default for all documents
Select Window > Output > Preflight to open the Preflight panel.
Select the panel menu icon and then select Enable Preflight For All Documents to turn on preflight for all documents.
Note
Disabling global preflight doesn't affect documents that already have preflight enabled. Each document maintains its own preflight state.
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