Overview
Most LaTeX trouble comes from a few sources: a template that fights the university's formatting rules, a preamble assembled from many online snippets, bibliography tools that do not match the chosen style, and tables or figures that float to the wrong place. Overleaf removes installation problems but not these. We diagnose the cause rather than adding more packages until the error disappears.
Typical work includes adapting an institutional thesis class or building a clean template that meets the graduate school's margins, spacing, front matter and numbering rules; configuring natbib or biblatex with the correct style; converting a Word draft into LaTeX; and typesetting mathematics, algorithms, chemical formulas or code listings. For journal submissions, we set up the publisher's class file and check that the source compiles in the submission system.
Typesetting is formatting, not content writing. We do not change your arguments or text beyond what formatting requires, and for students we follow your institution's rules on editorial help.
Who it’s for and the problems it solves
This is for you if you are…
- Master's and PhD students writing a thesis in LaTeX or Overleaf, often under deadline
- Researchers preparing manuscripts with a journal or conference class (for example elsarticle, IEEEtran, revtex, acmart, llncs)
- Students in mathematics, physics, computer science, engineering and economics who must submit problem sets or reports in LaTeX
- Research groups that want a shared template for theses and papers
- Anyone moving a long Word document into LaTeX
Common problems we help with
- The document will not compile and the log is hundreds of lines long
- Citations show as question marks, or the bibliography style does not match the required one
- Tables overflow the page, and multi-page tables break badly
- Figures float pages away from where they are discussed
- The graduate school rejected the thesis for margin, spacing or front-matter errors
- Collaborators on Overleaf keep breaking the preamble
What’s included — and what isn’t
Included
- Thesis and dissertation templates: adapting your university's class, or building one that meets written formatting requirements
- Journal and conference templates: setting up the publisher's class and checking submission requirements for source files
- Bibliographies: BibTeX with natbib, or biblatex with the Biber backend; styles such as APA, IEEE, Harvard variants, Vancouver and numeric; cleaning .bib files
- Integration with reference managers: Zotero with Better BibTeX, Mendeley and JabRef exports
- Tables: booktabs style, siunitx column alignment, tabularx, multirow and multicolumn, longtable for multi-page tables, landscape pages
- Mathematics: amsmath environments, equation numbering, theorem environments, custom macros for consistent notation
- Figures and diagrams: graphicx, subcaption, float placement, TikZ and pgfplots, importing vector figures from Python, R or Inkscape
- Specialized content: algorithm2e or algorithmicx, listings or minted for code, mhchem for chemistry, glossaries and acronyms
- Cross-referencing with cleveref and hyperref, PDF bookmarks and metadata, and PDF/A output where required
- Word-to-LaTeX conversion with Pandoc followed by manual cleanup
- Compile error diagnosis and teaching you to read the log
Not included
- Writing or rewriting thesis or paper content (see our editing services for language work)
- Bypassing university formatting approval or submission checks
- Fabricating or completing references that you have not provided
What you receive
- Working template or project
- A clean Overleaf project or LaTeX folder with a documented preamble, a main file and one file per chapter or section, compiling without errors.
- Bibliography setup
- Configured citation style, a cleaned .bib file with consistent keys and fields, and notes on how to add new references from your reference manager.
- Formatting checklist
- Your institution's or journal's formatting requirements mapped to the template settings that implement them, so you can verify compliance.
- Fix report
- For repair work, a list of the problems found, what was changed and why, so the same issues do not return.
- Short training session
- A walkthrough of the project structure, custom commands and common tasks such as adding figures, tables and citations.
How it works
Share the project
Invite us to the Overleaf project or send the source folder, with the formatting guidelines or journal instructions and a note of what is wrong.
Diagnose
We compile, read the log, review the preamble and identify conflicts, obsolete packages and requirement gaps.
Fix or build
We repair the existing project or set up a new template, migrating your content without changing your text.
Check compliance
We compare the output with the requirements: margins, fonts, spacing, headings, numbering, front matter and bibliography style.
Hand over
You receive the project, the fix report or checklist and a walkthrough.
Packages and practices we rely on
- Modular project structure
- A main file with \include or \input for chapters, a separate preamble file and a figures folder, so collaborators can work without conflicts.
- biblatex with Biber
- The modern bibliography approach with flexible styles and good Unicode and language support; natbib with BibTeX remains the right choice when a journal class requires it.
- booktabs and siunitx
- Clean horizontal rules without vertical lines, and numbers aligned on the decimal point with consistent units.
- TikZ and pgfplots
- Diagrams and plots drawn in LaTeX so fonts and sizes match the text, useful for schematics, commutative diagrams, graphs and flowcharts.
- Semantic macros
- Commands such as \vect{} or \R defined once, so notation can be changed globally and stays consistent.
- Log-first debugging
- Reading the first error in the log, isolating it with a minimal example and checking package documentation, rather than adding workarounds.
Bibliographies that compile and match the style
Citation problems usually come from mixing systems: loading natbib with a biblatex style, running BibTeX when the document expects Biber, or using a .bib file with inconsistent entry types. In Overleaf, the compiler detects the backend automatically in most cases, but only if the preamble is consistent. We choose one system, configure it for your required style and clean the .bib file so that authors, titles, DOIs and capitalization render correctly.
- Protect capitalization in titles with braces, for example {DNA} or {Bayesian}
- Use consistent citation keys, such as authorYEARkeyword, generated by your reference manager
- Include DOIs, and check that the style prints them as your guidelines require
Theses: meeting the graduate school's rules
University templates are sometimes outdated or unofficial. Formatting rules can cover margins for binding, line spacing, page numbering in front matter, the order of preliminary pages, heading styles and whether published papers can be included as chapters. We implement the written rules, not guesses, and tell you where a rule is ambiguous so you can confirm it with your graduate office. For formatting in Word, see final submission formatting.
Collaborating on Overleaf without breaking things
Shared projects fail when several people edit the preamble or add conflicting packages. We set up a protected preamble file, a notation file of shared macros and a short contributor note, and show you how to use Overleaf's history and labeled versions, or Git integration where your plan supports it, to recover from mistakes.
What the work can look like
Illustrative example — fictional data
Sample fix report for a thesis that would not compile
A doctoral candidate's 210-page Overleaf thesis stopped compiling a week before submission, and citations showed as question marks. The findings are invented for illustration.
Root cause
The preamble loaded both natbib and biblatex (through a copied snippet), and the bibliography used \bibliographystyle with biblatex, so no citations resolved. We removed natbib, set biblatex with the Biber backend and the required author-year style, and replaced \bibliography with \addbibresource and \printbibliography.
Secondary issues
Three .bib entries had unescaped ampersands in journal names, which caused silent failures; 14 tables used vertical rules and manual spacing, and were converted to booktabs with siunitx alignment. Two obsolete packages (subfigure, epsfig) were replaced with subcaption and graphicx.
Compliance check
Margins, 1.5 line spacing, roman numbering for front matter and the required order of preliminary pages were checked against the graduate school's written rules. One ambiguity about list of abbreviations placement was flagged for the candidate to confirm.
Illustrative example with invented details. Actual work depends on your project and your institution's requirements.
What you’ll need to provide
- Overleaf project access or a zipped source folder, including .bib and image files
- University thesis formatting guidelines or the journal's author instructions
- Required citation style and any official template
- A description of the problems, or the rejection notes from the graduate school or editorial office
- Deadline and whether you want the work done for you or a guided session
You don’t need everything ready to ask for a quote — tell us what you have and we’ll say what’s missing.
What affects price and turnaround
Price depends on
- Document length and number of chapters, figures, tables and references
- Repair of an existing project versus building a new template
- Complexity of tables, TikZ diagrams and mathematical content
- Word-to-LaTeX conversion and the amount of cleanup required
- Strictness and clarity of the formatting requirements
Turnaround depends on
- Completeness of the source files and guidelines you send
- Number of complex tables and figures to typeset or redraw
- Your submission deadline and time needed for your review
Every project is quoted individually. How we price our work.
Questions people ask before starting
Will you change the text of my thesis?
No. Typesetting changes layout, commands and formatting, not your wording. If you also want language editing, that is a separate editing service, and for student work it follows your institution's rules on editorial help.
Do I need Overleaf, or can you work with a local TeX installation?
Either. We work with Overleaf projects and with local TeX Live or MiKTeX installations in editors such as TeXstudio or VS Code with LaTeX Workshop. We will match your compiler (pdfLaTeX, XeLaTeX or LuaLaTeX) and tell you if a change is needed, for example for non-Latin scripts or system fonts.
Can you convert my Word thesis into LaTeX?
Yes. We use Pandoc for the first pass and then clean up headings, equations, tables, figures and citations by hand, because automatic conversion rarely handles them well. Equations written with Word's equation editor usually need manual checking.
Can you draw TikZ diagrams from my sketches?
Yes, for diagrams such as flowcharts, network diagrams, commutative diagrams, circuit schematics or conceptual frameworks. Send a clear sketch and any style requirements. For data plots, generating vector figures in Python or R and including them is often simpler; see our scientific figures support.
Will my document pass the journal's submission system?
We set up the official class file and test compilation, and we check the author instructions for requirements such as flattening files or supplying a .bbl file. We cannot control editorial decisions, and requirements change, so always check the current instructions.
Can you teach me LaTeX instead?
Yes. Sessions can cover document structure, mathematics, tables, figures and bibliographies, using your own document as the practice material.