Now import SVG in InDesign !

[Om Nath Jha]

Here’s one of the most requested features for InDesign! 

InDesign now lets you import the SVG and SVGZ format files in InDesign and InCopy documents. Earlier, SVGs from CC libraries were imported as PNGs in InDesign. 

 

Place the SVG file 

• To place the SVG file saved on your computer, choose File > Place. 
• To place the SVG available in your CC Libraries, choose File > Place from CC Libraries. 

Check this help article for complete details about this feature.

Feedback and questions:  

Reply to this post to share your feedback on this feature, and any questions you have around using it. Our team of experts here will do their best to assist you. 

[ABlecher]

I was very excited about this but it doesn't work for me. I have the latest version of InDesign and when I choose File, Place all I get is a pixeled mess. Any suggestions?

[Jongware]

Perhaps you forgot to enable "High Quality Display".

It's still a graphic file, and like all other formats, having huge images display in their original quality may will slow down your system.

[ABlecher]

You were correct. I had forgotten to view as high quality display. However, I didn't immediately think of this as I was under the impression that the placed SVG files would be editable. Can anyone confirm if SVG files placed in InDesign are intended to be editable or not? If not, this function is of no help to me as I work a lot with icons and need to edit the colour. My initial excitement was thinking I could do everything in InDesign and leave out the Illustrator part.

[Sandee Cohen]

Hi Bromiley,

If by editable, you mean the paths can be manipulated in InDesign, then no, SVG files are not editable in InDesign.

But you can still place the SVG and use "Edit With" to open the SVG in AI, edit it, and then save the SVG file. Basically, any art inside a graphic frame can only be edited by the graphic program that created it.

[Laubender]

Hi Bromiley,

since an SVG file is readable code you could open the file in a text editor and edit it there.

Did just that to correct some of my test SVG files from Adobe Illustrator where the viewPort property in the code was ignored. InDesign was placing the whole graphic visible instead the parts of the graphic that were on the artboard, only.

And I also have to add code to every SVG from Illustrator so that InDesign would not add an extra of 0.5 Pt to every edge of the placed graphic.

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[Laubender]

Thank you for asking, Om.

Think, I discovered a bug when working with SVG files saved from Adobe Illustrator.

Also reported this at Prerelease some months ago.

Illustrator is using viewBox entries. But InDesign will ignore them:

viewBox="0 0 100 100"

Instead it seems that the placing mechanism calculates the size of all elements. And here comes the bug:

And it adds always 0.5 Pt on every edge of the placed contents.

One can correct that, but this means that every SVG file from Adobe Illustrator has to be edited before being placed.

Just a sample code of an SVG below so everyone can test this.

Not edited SVG code from Adobe Illustrator:

<svg id="Ebene_1" data-name="Ebene 1" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewBox="0 0 100 100"><defs><style>.cls-1{fill:#e5007d;}.cls-2{fill:#ffed00;}</style></defs><title>284x284pt-Rectangle-Artboard-100x100pt</title><rect class="cls-1" x="-92" y="-92" width="284" height="284"/><rect class="cls-2" width="100" height="100"/></svg>

Edited SVG code to make the initial viewBox values work as expected:

<svg id="Ebene_1" data-name="Ebene 1" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="100" height="100"><defs><style>.cls-1{fill:#e5007d;}.cls-2{fill:#ffed00;}</style></defs><title>284x284pt-Rectangle-Artboard-100x100pt</title><rect class="cls-1" x="-92" y="-92" width="284" height="284"/><rect class="cls-2" width="100" height="100"/></svg>

Hope, this issue will be resolved in the next bugfix round for InDesign.

Thanks,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[Om Nath Jha]

Thanks for sharing the detailed information Uwe. I'll make sure it reaches to the team. I'll keep you posted about the update.

-Om

[Sandee Cohen]

Om,

I just discovered that in addition to adding extra space to SVG files, InDesign is also cutting off parts of the art with an incorrect Crop Box. I have seen this with files from The Noun Project. I described the effect in this post:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/indesign/svg-imported-with-wrong-content-frame/m-p/10779910#M166731

[rudiwarttmann]

Hi Om Nath Jha: It seems that you weren't successful. OK - it's just five years or so ... The bug still persists, and it's really annoying. Example:

[Abhishek Rao]

Hi @rudiwarttmann, 

Thank you for reaching out. Could you please provide a sample file for us to test? Additionally, could you confirm the storage location of the SVG file (local drive, remote location, external drive, or cloud)? Also, let us know if the SVG file was originally created by you (in which app) or if it was downloaded from somewhere.

Looking forward to your response.

^

Abhishek 

[Laubender]

Hi @Abhishek Rao ,

just use the raw SVG code I provided in my post above from 2019 and test for yourself:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/indesign-discussions/now-import-svg-in-indesign/m-p/10717683#M159403

Regards,
Uwe Laubender
( Adobe Community Expert )

[rudiwarttmann]

Hi,

the SVG was originally created by myself on my local machine with Adobe Illustrator CC 2025 and from there saved as a SVG 1.1 with default settings. You can find the SVG file here:

https://www.swisstransfer.com/d/905e493e-ec28-433b-b4bb-65960a5ffbd0

The file is stored on my MAC (MB Pro M4) local hard disk in a folder like "/users/rudiwarttmann/documents/..." and was placed into an empty InDesign CC 2025 file.

[Abhishek Rao]

Hi @Laubender and @rudiwarttmann, 

Thank you for the provided information. I tested it myself with the provided files. Please go through my screenshot below: 
On macOS: 
 

For Windows: 

The above is how I see when the files are place in the respective OSs. I will get this checked with the product team. Please allow me some time to get you the update. Moreover, @rudiwarttmann, could you confirm the exact version of InDesign 2025 you are on e.g., 20.0, 20.0.1 or 20.1. 

^

Abhishek

[rudiwarttmann]

Hi Abhisek: Thank you very much for taking care about this.
I'm afraid you're wrong - also on your MAC my SVG file (the striped one) is not placed correctly. You can clearly see the white space around the actual square within the graphic frame which is not part of the graphic.
The only difference in your two screens is that on MAC you'd enabled the "high" display performace, on WIN you hadn't.

I've been on MAC, InDesign CC 2025, v. 20.0.1; I've just updated to v. 20.1 and get the same - wrong - result with this.

Thanks, Rudi

[rudiwarttmann]

To make it crystal clear: This is the intended - correct - result:

You can see clearly that the graphic frame exactly matches the SVG dimensions, i.e. that there is no white space around.

[Abhishek Rao]

Hi @rudiwarttmann,

Thank you for the update and for providing further clarity. I understand the issue now, and I have reached out to the product team to investigate this. I’ll update you as soon as I hear back from them.

Thanks for your patience!

^
Abhishek

[Laubender]

Hi Rudi,

I see the same behavior like you with your SVG file.

What's unclear to me is how the parameters were with the export from Adobe Illustrator.

In the header information of your SVG file it says:

<!-- Generator: Adobe Illustrator 28.6.0, SVG Export Plug-In . SVG Version: 1.2.0 Build 709) -->

and:

<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" version="1.1" viewBox="0 0 14.01 14.01">

The latest version of Illustrator 2024 on macOS is 28.7.4.

When I open your SVG file in that version it shows like that:

There are several exports to SVG possible with Illustrator. With different capabilities and settings.

Could you provide the original* Adobe Illustrator file? I'd like to test some things…

( *Not the one where you opened your SVG file in Illustrator and saved it as *.ai file but the original one before the export to SVG.)

I'm asking this because if I change the artboard in Illustrator so that it is exactly the size and position of the artwork I can save a SVG file out of Illustrator that will place correctly with InDesign.

Under Save As in Illustrator I used the save as options with SVG this way where I disabled "Use artboard":

The following dialog below. Note that I disabled "Responsive" as option.

The header of that SVG file looks differnt compared to the SVG file you provided:

Placing this one ( the one of the two on the right ) in InDesign now gave the right result:

Thanks,
Uwe Laubender
( Adobe Community Expert )

[hansa24217613]

Good to hear that svg files can be placed in Indesign. Though, a bit dissapointed as it seems they will loose interactivity when exported to pdf. I use SolidWorks Composer to create svg:s with hotspots and BOMs but it seems this doesn't work when exported to pdf. Exporting to html seem to work but pdf would be better. Any ideas?

[Jongware]

Because the PDF format does not support everything that the SVG format supports.

Adobe can add all kinds of functionality to InDesign (multiplayer options! Facebook farms! Tetris!) but that does not automatically mean it will work the same way "in a PDF" (quoted, because even the mere classification "this will work in a PDF" needs additional footnotes detailing which features will work on what OS and in what local PDF viewer).

[BobLevine]

It is amazing how many people think that Adobe controls the PDF format and can magically make it do whatever they want.

[Steve Werner]

As Bob correctly points out, the PDF format is no longer Adobe's. It's now institutionalized into the world of standards organizations, where things c..h..a,.n..g..e.....v..e..r..y.....s..l..o..w..l..y!

[Jongware]

Of course, even back when Adobe did have the final say on everything related to PDF and kept their own reader up to date with the latest developments, they had no control at all over 3rd party viewers.

Back then Adobe controlled the PDF format but that did not magically make transparency work in Apple Preview.

[Laubender]

Thanks to Daniel who posted in a thread today the issue I have with viewBox is resolved.

Or at least there is a workaround. The thing I did by editing the SVG code and adding width and height before viewBox is done when you export to SVG with Illustrator and option "Responsive" is unchecked ( which in not the default ) :

Important note:

When you come accross an SVG from Illustrator where width and height before viewBox is missing, do not open the SVG in Illustrator and save again. SVG is an endformat! In this case edit the SVG file with your text editor.

Only if you still have the Adobe Illustrator file, open the AI file and save with option "Responsive" unchecked.

More details here:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/indesign/help-with-placing-svg-exported-from-illustrator/m-p/12090681...

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )