Abstract: A method and apparatus for formatting a document and creating a best document layout from an input list of picture and text objects is disclosed. The method includes calculating multiple document layouts while maintaining the correct reading order of the picture and text objects at all times. The method positions each picture and text object at multiple anchor points to create multiple document layouts, and then selects a best document layout which is the layout using the least number of pages to display the entire list of objects. If more than one layout uses the least number of pages, the layout positioning the least number of objects on the last page is the best layout.