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The hyperref documentation says: "Make sure it comes last of your loaded packages". The reason is that it redefines many LaTeX commands. It's a rule of thumb that helps to avoid errors.

However, there are exceptions, for instance the amsrefs user's guide notes that amsrefs has to be loaded after hyperref.

To avoid problems when adding hypertext functionality: do you know further such exceptions?

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    Someone should write a package that takes a set of package names and loads them in the best order. Not me, though. Commented Feb 9, 2012 at 1:02
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    My template (foundry.supelec.fr/gf/project/latextemplate) tries to do exactly this. It is full of \ExecuteAfterPackagesequences. Although I have to check with all the packages meantioned here! Commented Apr 25, 2012 at 18:25
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    Indeed, I changed the repository. It is now available for download at code.google.com/p/latexthesistemplate/downloads/list Commented Aug 24, 2013 at 15:04
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    @JimHefferon: Done by mhelvens: tex.stackexchange.com/q/123174/4918 Commented Mar 7, 2014 at 1:38
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    @JimHefferon there’s the pkgloader package: i’ve only speed-read the docs, but it looks a good step towards automation for the job. (i assume it’s a never-ending process, keeping it up-to-date, but it's looking good.) Commented Sep 3, 2014 at 20:46

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  • cleveref

Many others are documented in section 11.1 of the hyperref manual. Some are more complex than simply loading after hyperref. Here are some more common ones...

  • amsrefs
  • float before hyperref before algorithm
  • chappg
  • sidecap
  • linguex
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    Thanks, also for pointing to the README. hyperref has an extensive README. Though, some packages like cleveref, breakurl and others mentioned here weren't listed there. I'll check and perhaps send a note to the author, perhaps he would like to add them. Commented Aug 17, 2010 at 10:56
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    Good idea to contact the author. Heiko is generally very responsive about this things. Commented Aug 17, 2010 at 16:56
  • Thanks for improving my answer by adding the packages with options! (I already gave +1 to your answer, thus I cannot "more-upvote" here.) Commented Feb 9, 2012 at 18:50
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    As a note, sidecap no longer has to be loaded after hyperref (as of 2002/05/24 v1.5h according to the linked document.) Commented Mar 28, 2012 at 22:41
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    I really think that this is an example of one of the weaknesses of LaTex. Very frustrating behavior. Commented Dec 9, 2012 at 5:31
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and probably also further packages with \RequirePackage{hyperref}. A quick search in TeX Live 2011 resulted in this list:

Packages with \RequirePackage[<some option(s)>]{hyperref}:

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    According to texdoc geometry, it should read: With mag <> 1000... I have edited the reply. Commented Mar 21, 2012 at 13:19
  • @user946850: Yes, there is a "not equal" sign in the pdf which died during copy & paste. Thanks for the correction! Commented Mar 22, 2012 at 19:11
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    This may not be necessary any more for showkeys, as hyperref now has support for showkeys. See pages 207-208 of hyperref.pdf. Commented Feb 26, 2014 at 21:02
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    Well, I'm partly wrong. \bibitem doesn't show its key if showkeys is loaded before hyperref. On the other hand, \autopageref gets broken if showkeys comes after hyperref. What to do? Maybe a bug report. Commented Feb 26, 2014 at 21:42
  • could you update this to texlive 2017, if there are any changes? Commented Jul 3, 2017 at 9:40
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Other common ones include

  • bookmark
  • glossaries
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    Thanks! glossaries isn't even mentioned in manual or README. bookmark is recommended in the manual though without telling the loading order. Commented Aug 17, 2010 at 11:02
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    Hi Stefan, although glossaries can be loaded before hyperref, you have to jump through extra hoops to make it work quite as well. Nicola isn't terribly explicit about this in her glossaries manual, although in her only coded snippet involving hyperref she loads glossaries 2nd of all (see p. 69). For me, I've achieved much better results with glossary autohyperlinks loading the two packages in this order too. Commented Aug 17, 2010 at 11:34
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    @Stefan: Actually, the glossaries manual has this to say: “If you load the hyperref or html packages prior to loading the glossaries package, commands such as \glslink and \gls […] will automatically have hyperlinks …” Commented Aug 17, 2010 at 12:02
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I experienced problem with the package ellipsis when loaded before hyperref.

In addition, as Joseph Wright writes here, https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/64605/9632, cmap has to be loaded after hyperref.

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The tabularx package is definitely one of the candidates. Otherwise links to footnotes are prevented.

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    tabularx should be loaded after or before hyperref? I'm loading it before and doesn't seem to give me any errors, and both documentations say nothing about it... Commented Apr 24, 2013 at 8:37
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    I doubt this is valid. Could you provide proof? Commented Jul 25, 2015 at 1:02
  • I can verify that tabularx, loaded before hyperref causes trouble when you use footnotes in tables that are put inside a minipage. Commented Oct 2, 2017 at 18:22
  • Since loading tabularx/xltabular after hyperref the warning "pdfTeX warning (ext4): destination with the same identifier (name{table.X.X}) has been already used" is gone, too. Commented Jul 29, 2020 at 6:45
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Status in 2024

There are still loading order requirements, either because hyperref must overwrite a command or because other packages (like cleveref) wants to overwrite hyperref definitions.

But LaTeX offers now various tools (like the hook management) to avoid such loading order dances and they should not be viewed as inevitable fate but as something that can (and should) be repaired. For example amsmath already can also be loaded after hyperref.

Report issues!

So if there is some issue: open an issue at the hyperref github, or ask here with a concrete example.

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cleveref is one.

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Although not mentioned in its manual,

  • footnotebackref

loads hyperref without options before beginning its work. On that account, it might make better sense in documents to load footnotebackref second of the two.

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minitoc

From the minitoc documentation (section 2.17 Using the hyperref package with minitoc; emphasis added):

Since version #31, minitoc works correctly with the powerful hyperref package [...] If you add the loading of the hyperref package to a document yet using minitoc, you will get error message about spurious closing braces. Just let finish the LaTeX run, then re-LaTeX the document. There will be no problem if you remove the loading of hyperref and add it again: the problem occurs only when upgrading from minitoc #30 to minitoc #31 (or higher) with a document already processed and adding hyperref at the same time! It seems better to process the document with minitoc #31 (or higher) without hyperref, then with hyperref, because some internal commands written into the auxiliary files have been modified. If used, the hyperref package must be loaded before minitoc.

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One more is

To quote its README:

Allows hyperref package and the natbib package with options numbers and sort&compress to work together. This means that multiple sequential citations (e.g [3,2,1]) will be compressed to [1-3], where the '1' and the '3' are (color-)linked to the bibliography.

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    As far as I can tell, hypernat is obsolete. You shouldn't load it either after or before hyperref. With modern versions of natbib and hyperref the sort&compress works and is linked without loading any other packages. Commented Aug 23, 2010 at 9:03
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    You're right... that's one less package I can load now. Commented Sep 1, 2010 at 4:47
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I had some funny behaviour with pgfpages until I moved it after hyperref, but I'm not sure exactly what the issue was. I'm trying to replicate it, but I can't seem to get it to work at all now!

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Another package is apacite.

See also http://promberger.info/linux/2009/03/18/latex-using-apacite-and-hyperref-in-the-same-document/

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  • ocgx2

Besides providing commands for the creation and manipulation of PDF Layers (officially named Optional Content Groups), this package re-implements hyperref's ocgcolorlinks option.

\usepackage{hyperref} % do NOT set [ocgcolorlinks] here! \usepackage[ocgcolorlinks]{ocgx2}

This kind of coloured hyperlinks make use of PDF Layers in order to appear highlighted in the PDF viewer, but which are printed out on paper in the normal colour of the surrounding text, which is usually black.

As opposed to the original hyperref implementation, longer (ocg-)coloured links made with ocgx2 are allowed to wrap around line endings and page breaks.

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If hyperref comes before titlesec it produces the warning "The anchor of a bookmark and its parent's must not be the same" at \subsection and \subsubsection when using overleaf

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It may be late answer (more a tip), but it cost me a lot to find out, so let me add a tip for other Brazilian users which for some documents must use the regional standard package abntex2cite.

abntex2cite must always be after hyperref. If abntex2cite is placed before hyperref, then the .bbl file will have errors and the references won't be properly written. The references are the main (if not only) reason to use abntex2cite.

\usepackage{hyperref} \usepackage[alf]{abntex2cite} % Normas ABNT - Always after hyperref
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    abntex2cite is unsupported and deprecated for years. the way to go now is biblatex-abnt. Commented Mar 8, 2020 at 1:02
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    I agree abntex2cite is unsupported and old and so on. I've tested biblatex with abnt of my own, It works fine and is the way to go ... The real problem is I just don't know how to convence people like my advisor to use biblatex instead of bibtex AND at the same time correctly use the regional standard. Although he insists to use natbib, but natbib just doesn't write references and citations properly for all (many useless) cases. And in 2018 there was a huge update at the norms, which means more potential issues to deal. Commented Mar 8, 2020 at 2:16
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    @DanielDiniz, Read the section "3 O novo pacote biblatex" at CTAN abntex2cite. You still may use abntex2cite and abntex-alf.bst, but you will need to edit them in order to achieve the standard given by ABNT NBR 6023:2018 and ABNT NBR 10520:2002. Commented Aug 18, 2022 at 0:04
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    Read this small summary to understand what have changed between versions. If you're gonna choose biblatex updated to the 2018 version, you're gonna need to download files from GitHub biblatex. If you're gonna keep abntex2cite, you may ask me for files and/or details of implementation Commented Aug 18, 2022 at 0:08
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    hm, I see. well, in any case, AFAIK pretty much every brazilian college claims to follow ABNT but follows instead a weird mix of ABNT and arbitrary in-house rules. my school (IFCH/Unicamp) uses "rules" from the 90's... so it's a bit radical to say that abnt2cite has been deprecated, when its defaults still handle 90% of its users' needs Commented Aug 18, 2022 at 0:24

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