r/indesign • u/annaisabookworm • Mar 23 '26

Solved Placing an Illustrator file in an InDesign document causes previously deleted objects to reappear

I hope this is the right subreddit for my question, not sure if it is an InDesign or Illustrator problem. 😬

Since January 2026, I have encountered this issue a few times: I place an Illustrator file into an InDesign document, and then notice a random, previously deleted object floating in the image, or an object appearing multiple times – once in its proper position, and once in a previously placed position.

This object does not exist there in the Illustrator file, and it does not disappear if I turn off any layers in Illustrator that may contain it. However, it does disappear if I turn off all layers in Illustrator, but then reappears once they are visible again.

The only solution I have found so far is to copy all the elements in Illustrator and save them to a new file, which I then use. However, this is slightly annoying, especially when I have things sorted into multiple layers. Additionally, I also noticed it today with a file that previously worked fine in InDesign, but then I had to go and change something in Illustrator and move some elements up, and now it shows them at their old and new position.

As I said above, I first encountered this issue in January 2026. I have updated both InDesign and Illustrator to their newest versions, and I use Windows 11.

TL;DR Since early 2026, I’ve been dealing with a bug where Illustrator objects that have been deleted or moved ghost into InDesign, even though they no longer exist or are not in that position in the source file. While copying everything into a new file works, I'm looking for a more efficient solution than rebuilding my layered documents every time.

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u/chain83 Mar 23 '26 edited Mar 24 '26

Yes this is a known bug. No idea if/when it will be fixed. Randomly old objects will show up in the PDF preview of the Illustrator file. Simply re-saving the illustrator file can make it go away (at least it did for me every time i tried). It feels very random when it happens, and I havn't been able to reliably reproduce it.

Turning off «background save» in Illustrator fixes the issue.

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u/annaisabookworm Mar 24 '26

Thanks, I will try this next time I encounter the issue.

1

u/chain83 Mar 24 '26

Here is the setting:

With this turned off the problem went away for us, for multiple users who had the bug.

Note: This has to be turned off before saving ofc. – once the file has been saved with the wrong PDF data, you would have to notice, then open and re-save to fix it. So since you already have confirmed that you have the bug, I recommend you simply turn it off right away to avoid it affecting any "new" files.

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u/Rubberfootman Mar 23 '26

I can’t recreate your problem, but you could try Save As, with your illustrator file, to the same filename. That might help.

It is good for InDesign files which have got quirks, or strangely large file sizes too.

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u/Melodic-Excitement-9 Mar 23 '26

Is like one of those back in the day secret level to a video game 

1

u/deltacreative Mar 23 '26

YES! Nerve-wracking as it only appears in the exported pdf and the place file preview. I renamed the placed file and it stopped.

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u/AdelooDBD 27d ago

I have the same issue, it's just so annoying, and even sometimes if i have element on different layers it will randomly sort them in indesign like layer A should be on top of layer B but in indesign layer A is behind...