You placed the door. It's there in the 3D view and it's in the schedule. On the Level 2 plan there's a gap in the wall where it should be, and the sheet goes out this afternoon.
Revit almost never loses an element. Something about the view is telling it not to draw that door, and the job is working out which setting.
Start with the element itself
Find the element in a view where you can see it and select it. In the Properties palette, note its category, its workset and its Phase Created. You'll need all three for the checks below.
Then go back to the view where it's missing.
The usual causes, in a sensible order
- Hidden in view. Click the lightbulb, Reveal Hidden Elements, on the View Control Bar. Hidden elements show in magenta. Select yours, right-click and choose Unhide in View.
- Temporary Hide/Isolate. A border around the view labelled Temporary Hide/Isolate means something is hidden for now. Reset it from the sunglasses icon next to the lightbulb.
- Category turned off. Open Visibility/Graphics by typing VG and check that the category and its subcategories are ticked.
- A view filter. On the Filters tab of the same dialog, look for a filter your element matches that has Visibility unticked.
- View range. In a plan, open View Range from the Properties palette. An element that sits above the cut plane or below the view depth usually won't draw.
- Crop region. Turn on Crop Region Visible and see whether the element is outside it. In sections and elevations, check the far clip offset too.
- Phase. Compare the element's Phase Created and Phase Demolished with the view's Phase and Phase Filter. A wall created in a later phase than the view shows will not appear.
- Workset. On a workshared model, look at the Worksets tab in Visibility/Graphics, and check in the Worksets dialog that the workset is open at all.
- Design option. Elements in a secondary option only show in views set to display that option, on the Design Options tab of Visibility/Graphics.
- Discipline and detail level. A view set to the Structural discipline hides non-load-bearing walls. A family can also be built to show parts of its geometry only at certain detail levels.
- A linked model. If the element lives in a link, its visibility is set on the Revit Links tab of Visibility/Graphics, not on the host's categories.
- Something in front of it. A masking region, a filled region or another element can cover it. Hover over the spot and press Tab to see what sits on top.
- View template. If the view has a template, the settings it controls are greyed out in the view. You have to change them in the template, which changes every view that uses it.
Where the checklist lets you down
That's thirteen places to look, and Revit doesn't tell you which one applies. You open each dialog, find nothing wrong, close it and try the next.
The causes also stack. You turn the category back on and the door is still missing, because a filter catches it as well. Sooner or later it's tempting to give up and model the thing again, which is how a project ends up with two doors in one opening.
Find out what is hiding it without the checklist. A free tool runs every check above against your element and names the cause, with no card needed. Download NexionTools free
Getting the answer in one go
Element X-Ray is one of the 12 free tools in NexionTools. It works through the checklist for you.
- Select the element in any view where you can see it, or type its element ID into the tool.
- Click Element X-Ray on the NexionTools tab and pick the view where the element is missing, from a searchable list of the project's views.
- Press Diagnose. It runs 60 checks on that element in that view.
The problems come back at the top, each with a short explanation and a suggestion. Everything that passed is folded away underneath.
About ten of the causes carry a Fix It button. It can unhide the element, turn the category back on, switch a filter's visibility back on, clear an element override, expand the crop or end a temporary hide.
The rest it leaves to you on purpose. View range, phase filter, design option and discipline are decisions about how the view should work, so the tool names the one responsible and you make the change.
A few things to know before you rely on it. It checks one element against one view at a time, so it won't audit a whole project. Revit switches to the view you picked in order to run the checks. Sheets aren't in the list, only the views placed on them.
If the view belongs to someone else, Copy Report puts the full result on the clipboard so you can send them the reason along with the request.
Stop guessing which setting it is. Element X-Ray is free forever, needs no credit card, and installs alongside 11 other free tools. Download NexionTools free