Build your understanding of website navigation and hierarchy.
Explore website navigation and hierarchy, with practical workflows, a working example and checks for common mistakes.
Explore the guide ↗Information Architecture Lab is a focused resource for information architects and content designers, exploring website navigation and hierarchy through the work people actually need to perform. For this topic, the workflow is to group related information, use recognisable labels, and test important navigation paths. This guide uses a page hierarchy map to hold the decisions together and examines label clarity, content relationships and navigation depth as distinct quality concerns.
The example involves a visitor trying to find help across several disconnected sections; it is an illustrative exercise for this subject, rather than a reported client result. Information architecture should use categories visitors recognise. Inspect relationships between pages and test likely routes, rather than reproducing the organisation chart or treating the navigation menu as the complete content model.
Inside the practice
WEB / 10 SECTIONSWhere website navigation and hierarchy begins
Start by describing the task that makes website navigation and hierarchy relevant now. Use the situation of a visitor trying to find help across several disconnected sections to identify the practical question before choosing a method. A concern involving label clarity may require different evidence from a concern involving content relationships.
Keep those questions visible in a page hierarchy map, alongside the intended outcome. The scope of website navigation and hierarchy becomes easier to discuss when an agreed requirement is clearly distinguished from an idea that still needs investigation. Before proceeding with website navigation and hierarchy, decide whether the current state of navigation depth creates a dependency that needs another person's input.
A page hierarchy map
Use a page hierarchy map as a shared reference for this piece of website navigation and hierarchy. The record is especially useful when information architects and content designers need to explain why a particular route was chosen. Connect the entry about label clarity to the relevant evidence for website navigation and hierarchy, rather than copying information without its source context.
Review a page hierarchy map after a meaningful change; an abandoned reference can mislead the next person working on website navigation and hierarchy.
The first working stage is to group related information. In the example involving a visitor trying to find help across several disconnected sections, identify which input is needed before this action can produce a dependable result. Consider how questions about label clarity affect the starting conditions for the action to group related information, including information that has not been confirmed.
Record the outcome in a page hierarchy map and explain any limitation before asking somebody to use recognisable labels. This creates a traceable starting point for website navigation and hierarchy, making an incomplete input easier to recognise before it influences the rest of the work.
Use recognisable labels
04 / 10Continue by deciding how to use recognisable labels under the agreed conditions. The handoff from the first stage of website navigation and hierarchy should contain the information this action actually requires. Before you use recognisable labels, inspect content relationships and identify any assumption that has become doubtful.
If the situation involving a visitor trying to find help across several disconnected sections reveals a different requirement, update a page hierarchy map before expanding the work. A visible change decision keeps website navigation and hierarchy coherent and helps the next participant understand whether the original scope still applies.
Test important navigation paths
The third stage is to test important navigation paths, bringing the current piece of website navigation and hierarchy to an understandable state. Check navigation depth against the agreed purpose of website navigation and hierarchy, not merely against a list of completed activities. Use a page hierarchy map to identify follow-up responsibilities and relevant limits.
In the example of a visitor trying to find help across several disconnected sections, ask what the receiving person would need before relying on the output. Closing this stage of website navigation and hierarchy clearly prevents an unfinished dependency from being mistaken for an accepted result.
Avoid organising pages around internal departments rather than visitor tasks
A specific failure pattern in website navigation and hierarchy is organising pages around internal departments rather than visitor tasks. It can create a gap between the appearance of progress and the actual outcome needed by information architects and content designers. Check whether label clarity was understood before the action began and whether content relationships was examined by somebody with the relevant context.
Capture the correction in a page hierarchy map, including its effect on navigation depth. The aim is to reduce the opportunity for organising pages around internal departments rather than visitor tasks to recur, while keeping the process proportionate to the work.
Work through a realistic situation
Consider a visitor trying to find help across several disconnected sections as a small rehearsal of website navigation and hierarchy. Write down the request and expected result, then identify who performs the action to group related information. Before moving to the instruction to use recognisable labels, ask which information the next participant needs.
Use a page hierarchy map to preserve any question the example exposes, especially where label clarity is uncertain. Then decide how to test important navigation paths without hiding a concern about navigation depth.
Check label clarity
The review criteria for this guide are label clarity, content relationships and navigation depth. Examine each criterion separately in the context of website navigation and hierarchy, because a positive finding in one area does not settle the other questions. For information architects and content designers, a useful review records what was examined and how the finding affects the next action.
Connect the evidence to a page hierarchy map, including any limitation in the material available. In the situation involving a visitor trying to find help across several disconnected sections, identify which finding would prevent a responsible handover. This approach makes the review of website navigation and hierarchy explainable, rather than treating an unexplained approval label as evidence that the task is ready.
Keep the guidance useful after the first pass
Maintenance of website navigation and hierarchy should respond to changes in the task, its inputs and its responsible people. Assign an owner to a page hierarchy map and explain which events should trigger another review. A changed assumption about label clarity may affect the earlier decision to group related information; a concern about navigation depth may require a new closing check.
Remove obsolete directions from a page hierarchy map deliberately so that earlier versions do not compete with approved guidance. When content relationships changes, explain whether the instruction to use recognisable labels needs different inputs or a revised decision.
Choose a practical next step
10 / 10Begin with one bounded task involving website navigation and hierarchy rather than a complete redesign of the surrounding operation. Prepare a page hierarchy map, work through the three actions and inspect the result using the criteria for label clarity, content relationships and navigation depth. Ask someone from the intended audience of information architects and content designers to identify a point that still needs clarification.
Compare that observation with the example of a visitor trying to find help across several disconnected sections, then choose a specific change worth testing.