# Approved page sits in the wrong place in the target space, or shows Failed with "Parent page is not published" **What you are seeing** * A page was approved and published, but it sits higher up the target space than its parent, for example at the top of the space or under the parent page you set on the Structure tab. * Or, on a page approved before 19 October 2026, it shows Failed with **Parent page is not published and could not be published**. --- ## Why it happens With **Preserve hierarchy** on, a publish triggered by an approval never publishes unapproved parent pages for you. Only a manual publish does that, after asking **Publish page tree?**. Since 19 October 2026 an approved page whose parent page is not published yet still publishes. It goes under its nearest ancestor that is already in the target space, or under the parent page set on the Structure tab, or the target space homepage when there is nothing above it. Parent folders are always created as needed. The page is then remembered as waiting for its parent, and when the parent page is published, by approval, by hand or in a bulk run, the waiting pages move under it. 📝 The order of approvals no longer matters. Approve the children first and the parent last, or all of them at once, and the tree ends up the same. Before that date, the same page either landed at the top of the target space and stayed there, or failed with the message above when a parent page was configured. --- ## What to do 1. Publish the parent page. Approve it, or select **Publish** in its Publishing byline. 2. Wait a few minutes. A check runs about a minute after each publish and tries again after 5, 10 and 15 minutes if Confluence was slow to answer. 3. If a page still shows Failed from before 19 October 2026, open the Publishing space page and select **Retry** next to Failed on the **Dashboard**, or republish the page from its byline. ![Publishing Settings Structure tab showing Page structure set to Preserve hierarchy and the Update existing pages by title switch turned off](https://help.gocapable.com/images/a928d8a8-3a0f-4f3b-9141-a4bae2fa7c68.webp) Page structure and Update existing pages by title both live on the Structure tab. If you do not want to mirror the page tree at all, set **Page structure** to **Flatten to parent** on the Structure tab. Every page then goes straight under the parent page or space root. --- ## A few things that catch people out * Pages you moved by hand in the target space are never moved back. Only pages that sit where Publishing itself put them are re-placed. * A folder that already existed in the target space with the same title is reused and never moved. Folders Publishing created itself can be moved. * A manual publish can still fail with **Parent page is not published and could not be published** when a parent page cannot be published, for example because it carries the `capable_never_publish` label. * The byline shows **Unpublishable** with the tooltip **Parent page is not published** on a page under an unpublished parent. You can still publish it by hand; you will be asked to publish the parent pages too. * Re-placing only happens with Preserve hierarchy. With Flatten to parent nothing waits and nothing moves. --- ## Related ### [Publish on approval](https://help.gocapable.com/publishing/publish-on-approval.html) How approvals trigger a publish. ### [Publishing folders](https://help.gocapable.com/publishing/publishing-folders.html) How folders are created and kept in place. ### [Publishing settings](https://help.gocapable.com/publishing/publishing-settings.html) Page structure and the parent page. ### [Nothing publishes when approvals are approved, and there is no "Publish approved pages" button](https://help.gocapable.com/publishing/nothing-publishes-when-approvals-are-approved-and-there-is-no-publish-approved-pages-button.html) When Approval is not in your app. ### [Export and published sites](https://help.gocapable.com/publishing/export-and-published-sites.html) The rest of this family. --- _Approve in any order. The tree sorts itself out._