Markdown editors do not provide Document Symbols

Support Bug Reports
1

Describe the Bug

  • Go to Symbol in Editor (⌘⇧O) reports “The active text editor does not provide symbol information.”
  • Breadcrumbs do not show Markdown headings.
  • Sticky Scroll does not work for Markdown.
  • The same file works correctly in the latest VS Code.

Steps to Reproduce

Steps to Reproduce

  1. Create a new Markdown file named test.md.
  2. Add the following content:

A

B

C

  1. Save the file.
  2. Press Cmd+Shift+O (Go to Symbol in Editor).

Expected Behavior

The symbol list should show:

  • A
  • B
  • C

Breadcrumbs and Sticky Scroll should also recognize the headings.

Actual Behavior

Cursor shows:
“The active text editor does not provide symbol information.”

No document symbols are available.
Breadcrumbs and Sticky Scroll do not work for Markdown.

Operating System

MacOS

Version Information

Version: 3.12.17
VS Code Extension API: 1.128.0
Commit: 0fb762053c34788bb7760d5673f8a6d4c8589d50
Date: 2026-07-17T02:53:53.006Z
Layout: IDE
Build Type: Stable
Release Track: Default
Electron: 40.10.3
Chromium: 144.0.7559.236
Node.js: 24.15.0
V8: 14.4.258.32-electron.0
xterm.js: 6.1.0-beta.256
OS: Darwin arm64 25.5.0

Does this stop you from using Cursor

No - Cursor works, but with this issue

6

Hey there!

I tested this on a clean 3.12 build and Go to Symbol, breadcrumbs, and sticky scroll all work for Markdown, so this looks specific to your setup rather than a break in the build itself. That exact error means the built-in Markdown language server isn’t registering symbols for the file on your machine.

A few things to try, in order:

  1. Reload the window (Cmd+Shift+P → Developer: Reload Window) and retest — this clears a stalled extension host.
  2. Open the Extensions view, search @builtin markdown, and make sure Markdown Language Features is enabled. If it’s off, enable it and reload.
  3. Check the language mode in the bottom-right status bar reads Markdown, and that you’re in the source editor rather than the rendered preview.
  4. If you have any third-party Markdown extensions (Markdown All in One, markdownlint, etc.), disable them temporarily and reload to rule out a conflict.

If it’s still broken after that, could you open View → Output, pick the Markdown Language Server channel from the dropdown, and paste anything that appears there, plus a screenshot of the file with the language mode visible? That’ll tell us whether the language server is failing to start on your end.

7

Thank you very much. It worked after I disabled the Markdown All in One.