# Navigation editor (/docs/core/editing/navigation)



# Navigation editor [#navigation-editor]

The sidebar order comes from the `meta.json` files in your docs. Editing those by hand is fiddly and easy to get wrong, so Atlas gives you a visual editor instead: drag a page to move it, and Atlas writes the `meta.json` for you.

<ThemeImage name="navigation" alt="The navigation editor" />

## Sections [#sections]

Large docs are split into top-level **sections**, which show up as a page switcher rather than as rows in the sidebar. Atlas detects these root sections and gives you a switcher at the top of the navigation editor, so you can edit one section's sidebar at a time.

Pick **Home** to edit the root sidebar, or pick a section to edit just that part.

## Reordering [#reordering]

Drag any item to move it. You can drop it above or below another item to set the order, and the change is saved to that folder's `meta.json` straight away. No YAML, no commas to get wrong.

## Item types [#item-types]

The sidebar is made of a few kinds of items:

* **Pages** are your MDX files.
* **Folders** group pages into a nested section.
* **Separators** are labels that break the list into groups.
* **Links** point somewhere else, like an external URL.

You can add separators and links from the editor to shape how the sidebar reads.

<Callout type="info">
  Reordering only changes `meta.json`, never your page content. If a page is not listed in `meta.json`, it still exists; it just is not pinned to a position in the sidebar.
</Callout>

## Next steps [#next-steps]

<Cards>
  <Card title="Manage media" href="/docs/core/editing/media" />

  <Card title="Scaffold pages from templates" href="/docs/core/content/templates" />
</Cards>