The Structure of a Document

Last updated on 2026-07-26 | Edit this page

Estimated time: 25 minutes

Overview

Questions

  • How are LaTeX documents structured?

Objectives

  • Identify the different kinds of section commands in LaTeX.

Sections

In a word processor, you might use headings to organize your document.In LaTeX, we’ll use the section commands:

  • \section{...}
  • \subsection{...}

LaTeX will handle all of the numbering, formatting, vertical spacing, fonts, and so on in order to keep these elements consistent throughout your document. Let’s add sections to our document.

LATEX 

% This command tells LaTeX what kind of document we are creating (article).
\documentclass{article}


% Everything before the \begin{document} command is called the preamble.
\begin{document} % The document body starts here

% The section command automatically numbers and formats the section heading.
\section{My First Section}

Hello World!

This is my first LaTeX document.

I can add content to my first section!

% The subsection command does the same thing, but for sections within sections.
\subsection{This is a Subsection of my First Section}

I can put a subsection inside my first section.

\section{This is a Second Section}

And this text will go into another section.

\end{document}

You should have something that looks like this:

Our document with sections added.
Callout

There are many different section commands in LaTeX, including \subsubsection{...}, \paragraph{...}, \chapter{...}, and more. Each of these commands will create a new section heading with a different level of indentation and numbering.

Some of these commands are only available in certain document classes, so be sure to check the documentation for the class you are using.

Callout

There’s also an alternative way to create sections in LaTeX using the \section*{...} command. This command will create a section heading without numbering it. This can be useful for creating unnumbered sections, such as an introduction or conclusion.

Table of Contents

We’ve seen how to make sections and how LaTeX will automatically number them for us. But we can also use this feature to automatically generate a table of contents for our document! We can do this by adding the \tableofcontents command to our document body. This will create a table of contents at the location where the command is placed.

LATEX 

% This command tells LaTeX what kind of document we are creating (article).
\documentclass{article}


% Everything before the \begin{document} command is called the preamble.
\begin{document} % The document body starts here

\tableofcontents

% The section command automatically numbers and formats the section heading.
\section{My First Section}

Hello World!

This is my first LaTeX document.

I can add content to my first section!

% The subsection command does the same thing, but for sections within sections.
\subsection{This is a Subsection of my First Section}

I can put a subsection inside my first section.

\section{This is a Second Section}

And this text will go into another section.

\end{document}
Our document with a table of contents.

Challenges

Challenge

Challenge 1:

Key Points
  • LaTeX documents are structured using section commands.
  • There are many different section commands in LaTeX, including \subsubsection{...}, \paragraph{...}, \chapter{...}, and more.