MkDocs Documentation Site Generator

MkDocs is a fast, simple static site generator for building project documentation from Markdown files. Configuration uses a single YAML file (mkdocs.yml).

Quick Start

Installation

# Install MkDocs
pip install mkdocs

# Verify installation
mkdocs --version

Create New Project

# Create project structure
mkdocs new my-project
cd my-project

# Start development server
mkdocs serve

Project Structure Created:

my-project/
├── mkdocs.yml      # Configuration file
└── docs/
    └── index.md    # Homepage

Minimal Configuration

# mkdocs.yml
site_name: My Project
site_url: https://example.com/
nav:
  - Home: index.md
  - About: about.md

Core Commands

Common Options:

• -f, --config-file FILE - Use custom config file
• -s, --strict - Fail on warnings
• -d, --site-dir DIR - Custom output directory
• --dirty - Only rebuild changed files
• --clean - Clean output before build

Project Structure

project/
├── mkdocs.yml              # Configuration (required)
├── docs/
│   ├── index.md            # Homepage
│   ├── about.md            # Additional pages
│   ├── user-guide/
│   │   ├── index.md        # Section homepage
│   │   ├── getting-started.md
│   │   └── configuration.md
│   ├── img/                # Images
│   │   └── logo.png
│   └── css/                # Custom CSS
│       └── extra.css
└── custom_theme/           # Theme customizations (optional)
    └── main.html

Navigation Configuration

# Automatic navigation (alphabetically sorted)
# Omit nav key to auto-generate

# Explicit navigation with sections
nav:
  - Home: index.md
  - User Guide:
      - Getting Started: user-guide/getting-started.md
      - Configuration: user-guide/configuration.md
  - API Reference: api/
  - External Link: https://example.com/

Writing Documentation

Internal Links

# Link to another page

[See Configuration](configuration.md)

# Link to page in another directory

[Installation](../getting-started/installation.md)

# Link to section anchor

[See Options](configuration.md#options)

Page Metadata

---
title: Custom Page Title
description: Page description for SEO
authors:
  - John Doe
date: 2024-01-01
---
# Page Content Here

Code Blocks

```python
def hello():
    print("Hello, World!")
```

Tables

| Header 1 | Header 2 |
| -------- | -------- |
| Cell 1   | Cell 2   |

Theme Configuration

Built-in Themes

# Default MkDocs theme
theme:
  name: mkdocs
  color_mode: auto           # light, dark, auto
  user_color_mode_toggle: true
  nav_style: primary         # primary, dark, light
  highlightjs: true
  navigation_depth: 2
  locale: en

# ReadTheDocs theme
theme:
  name: readthedocs
  prev_next_buttons_location: bottom
  navigation_depth: 4
  collapse_navigation: true

Material for MkDocs (Popular Third-Party)

pip install mkdocs-material

theme:
  name: material
  palette:
    primary: indigo
    accent: indigo
  features:
    - navigation.tabs
    - navigation.sections
    - search.suggest

Custom CSS/JavaScript

extra_css:
  - css/extra.css

extra_javascript:
  - js/extra.js
  - path: js/analytics.mjs
    type: module

Plugins

plugins:
  - search:
      lang: en
      min_search_length: 3
  - tags
  - blog

Popular Plugins:

• search - Full-text search (built-in, enabled by default)
• blog - Blog functionality (Material theme)
• tags - Content categorization
• social - Social media cards

Note: Defining plugins disables defaults. Add - search explicitly.

Markdown Extensions

markdown_extensions:
  - toc:
      permalink: true
      separator: "-"
  - tables
  - fenced_code
  - admonition
  - pymdownx.highlight
  - pymdownx.superfences

Deployment

GitHub Pages

# Deploy to gh-pages branch
mkdocs gh-deploy

# With options
mkdocs gh-deploy --force --message "Deploy docs"

Build for Any Host

# Build static files
mkdocs build

# Files output to site/ directory
# Upload to any static host

Custom Domain

Create docs/CNAME file:

docs.example.com

Common Workflows

New Documentation Project

1. Create project: mkdocs new my-docs
2. Edit mkdocs.yml with site_name and nav
3. Add Markdown files to docs/
4. Preview: mkdocs serve
5. Build: mkdocs build
6. Deploy: mkdocs gh-deploy

Quick Build Preview

Bash(mkdocs build --dry-run)

If clean: Bash(mkdocs serve -v) (dev preview).

Add New Section

1. Create directory: docs/new-section/
2. Add index.md and content files
3. Update nav in mkdocs.yml
4. Preview and verify links

Customize Theme

1. Set theme.custom_dir: custom_theme/
2. Create override files matching theme structure
3. Use template blocks to extend base templates

Safe Preview Workflow

1. Check MkDocs: Bash(which mkdocs || echo "Install: pip install mkdocs")
2. Dry-run build: Bash(mkdocs build --dry-run)
3. List issues: Grep -r "ERROR" site/

Detailed References

• Configuration options: See references/configuration.md
• Theme customization: See references/themes.md
• Plugin development: See references/plugins.md
• Deployment strategies: See references/deployment.md
• Best practices: See references/best-practices.md

Gotchas

• mkdocs serve watches docs/ and mkdocs.yml but NOT files included via include_dir or theme overrides — edits to custom_theme/main.html don't trigger reload. Restart the server.
• Defining plugins: in mkdocs.yml disables the default search plugin — pages stop being indexed and the search box returns nothing. Always include - search explicitly when listing plugins.
• mkdocs gh-deploy force-pushes to gh-pages — any manual edits or other branches deployed there get destroyed silently. Use --no-history for clean history but never edit gh-pages by hand.
• use_directory_urls: true (default) changes link semantics: page.md becomes page/ not page.html. Relative links in raw Markdown that worked locally as files break on the deployed site.
• strict: true fails on warnings including unrecognized config keys — adding a Material-theme-only option to a config that uses the default theme fails the build, not just warns. Check theme compatibility before enabling strict.
• Material theme's navigation.instant feature breaks third-party JS that runs on page load — analytics, Mermaid, MathJax all need explicit document$.subscribe() hooks instead of DOMContentLoaded.
• mkdocs build --dirty skips unchanged files but doesn't detect changes to navigation or theme config — pages render with stale nav. Use --clean (default) or delete site/ when in doubt.