List items must sit inside a list

PDF/UA check LIST_PARENT_ELEMENT · Lists · severity Medium · PDF/UA 8.2.5.25 List

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Why it matters#

List items must be inside list containers for screen readers to announce them as lists. Otherwise, items appear as disconnected paragraphs without indicating they're part of a list.

What you will see#

An LI element is not inside an L element, so the items are not announced as a list.

How to fix#

Move each LI element so it is a direct child of an L element. If an LI has no list container, wrap it and its sibling items in a new L element.

Step-by-step guide#

1. Open the Accessibility tags panel (View > Show/Hide > Side panels > Accessibility tags) and locate each flagged LI whose parent is not an L element.
2. If the list items sit loose under a Sect, Div, or the document root: right-click at that position, choose New Tag > List (L), and drag all consecutive LI elements of the same visual list into the new L, preserving their order.
3. If an extra wrapper sits between the L and its items (e.g. L > Div > LI), drag each LI up so its immediate parent is the L, then delete the emptied wrapper tag.
4. For a nested list, place the sub-list's L element inside the parent item (as a child of that LI's LBody), not as a sibling of the LI elements; the sub-list's own LI children then remain direct children of the nested L.
5. If content was mis-tagged as LI but is not actually a list item (a converter artifact), retag it as P instead of forcing it into a list.
6. Check that each moved LI now has L as its immediate parent and that its own content sits in Lbl and LBody substructure; do not leave stray non-item paragraphs directly under the L element.

Verify: Re-run the EQChecker scan and confirm LIST_PARENT_ELEMENT passes. A screen reader should announce the list with its item count.

Note: Per ISO/TS 32005 (referenced by PDF/UA-2 8.2.5.25), LI is only valid inside L. If the list continues from or into another list (e.g. split across a page or interrupted by a figure), keep them as separate L elements and set the ContinuedList attribute to true, with ContinuedFrom where the previous list is in the same document; do not merge unrelated items into one L just to satisfy the parent rule.

WCAG success criteria#

1.3.1 Info and Relationships — Level A#

Structure and relationships conveyed visually (headings, lists, tables, labels, groups) must also be available programmatically.

Understanding 1.3.1

Standards#

This check contributes to the following standards:

PDF/UA WCAG A EN 301 549