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Open your site in the Weebly editor and click Preview in the top toolbar. Weebly opens a full-width visitor view without publishing the site. Use the phone and computer icons to inspect responsive layouts, use Share for a private review link when available, then return to editing and choose Publish only after your checks are complete.
Preview a Weebly site without making it live
- Open the site in the Weebly editor.
- Click Preview in the top toolbar.
- Review the full-width rendering, which shows the page outside the editing canvas.
- Choose the phone icon and then the computer icon to check responsive layouts.
- Move through every page and navigation item, checking headings, images, buttons, links, forms, and page metadata.
- If someone else needs to review the draft, click Share in preview mode and send the private link.
- Return to the editor, correct problems, preview again, and click Publish when the site is ready.
Preview and Publish are separate actions. Opening Preview does not make the draft publicly available; Publish is the action that puts the site online.
What to inspect in desktop and mobile preview
A page that looks correct in the editor can change when rendered at a visitor’s width. Treat the two device controls as separate checks rather than assuming one view represents the other.
| Area | Computer view | Phone view |
|---|---|---|
| Navigation | Check the full menu, logo alignment, and active-page state. | Open the mobile menu and confirm it expands, closes, and exposes every page. |
| Layout | Look for unexpected empty columns, overlapping sections, or excessive horizontal space. | Check stacking order, clipped content, sideways scrolling, and spacing between sections. |
| Text | Confirm headings, line breaks, contrast, and hierarchy. | Check that text remains readable without zooming and that headings do not collide with buttons or images. |
| Images and media | Verify cropping, captions, and alignment. | Confirm images resize within the viewport and do not push content wider than the screen. |
| Calls to action | Test button position and link destination. | Make sure tap targets are separated and large enough to select reliably. |
Follow links in the preview where Weebly permits it, and open each destination in a separate tab so you can return to the draft. Check the browser tab title and the page’s description fields as well as visible copy; these affect how a shared or published page is identified.
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Send a private Weebly preview for feedback
Editor Preview and Share
The editor’s Share control in preview mode can create a private link for feedback. Send that link only to the people who need to review the draft, and tell them which pages or breakpoints to examine. Ask reviewers to report the page name, device type, and exact problem so you can reproduce it in the editor.
Weebly Cloud Admin preview URL
Weebly Cloud documentation describes a temporary preview URL that can be copied from the browser address bar and sent to team members or site owners. That documentation says the URL remains valid for 30 days. The Cloud Admin preview button is not available to users who enter the site from the User Portal, so the control you see depends on how the site is managed.
A preview URL is not a substitute for access control. Anyone who receives the link may be able to view the draft during its validity period, so share it through the same controlled channel you use for other unpublished material.
Know what Preview cannot verify
Weebly Cloud documentation lists several features that do not work in preview sites:
- Blogs
- Commerce and store functions
- Search
- Forms
- Membership
Use Preview for visual and navigation review, but do not treat a successful visual check as proof that checkout, form submission, search indexing, member access, or blog behavior is ready. Verify those functions separately through an appropriate test process after publication or in a controlled environment. For a store, use a safe product and payment test path; for forms, confirm delivery and storage with a non-sensitive test submission; for membership, test both signed-out and signed-in states.
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A complete pre-publish quality checklist
Page-by-page content
- Open every page from the navigation and confirm that the page title matches its purpose.
- Read headings, body copy, labels, captions, and footer text for omissions and spelling errors.
- Click internal and external links, buttons, downloads, and email links.
- Check image quality, alternative text, focal-point cropping, and captions.
Responsive behavior
- Use both phone and computer preview controls on every important page.
- Look for clipped text, horizontal scrolling, overlapping elements, and buttons that move below the content they describe.
- Confirm that the mobile navigation opens and closes and that long pages remain usable.
Page information and sharing
- Confirm each page title and description in the relevant page settings.
- Check that the intended homepage is selected and that navigation labels are clear.
- Review the footer, contact details, social links, and any legal or privacy links.
Functional follow-up
Record the features that Preview cannot execute, then schedule separate checks for forms, search, blog posts, commerce, and membership. Keep test data non-sensitive and remove test orders or submissions according to your site’s procedures.
Choose the address and control access before launch
Set a Weebly subdomain when no custom domain is ready
In Settings > General, Weebly lets you choose a free yournamehere.weebly.com subdomain before publishing. Check spelling, capitalization, and whether the address is the one you intend to share. A typo in the address can make a correctly published site appear to be missing.
Password-protect a whole site or page
For a controlled audience, configure whole-site or page-level password protection in General Settings or the individual page settings. Save the change and publish it; visitors receive the protection only after that setting is published. Password protection is useful for a staging audience, but it does not make unsupported preview functions work.
Preview troubleshooting
The Preview button is missing
Make sure you are editing the site rather than viewing it through a User Portal or another administrative screen. The available controls differ between the standard editor and Weebly Cloud Admin. Return to the site’s editor and look in the top toolbar.
A reviewer cannot open the link
Regenerate or recopy the link from Share, verify that the entire URL was sent, and check whether the temporary Cloud Admin link has passed its documented 30-day validity. If the site is password-protected, provide the password through a separate secure channel.
Forms, checkout, search, or membership appears broken
This is expected for the unsupported preview features listed by Weebly Cloud. Do not keep changing page layout to fix a function that Preview does not run. Publish to a controlled environment or use a separate test process, then verify the feature there.
The published site is not visible
Confirm that you clicked Publish, not only Preview, and check the address for typographical errors. Also verify that you are opening the intended subdomain or custom domain. These are the first checks in Weebly’s publishing troubleshooting guidance.
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Preview again from the editor, clear a stale browser tab, and compare the exact URL and page path. Recheck responsive views and any elements whose content is loaded dynamically. If a change is still absent, confirm that it was saved before publishing.
Take a site offline after publishing
If you need to withdraw a published site, use Unpublish from Site Settings. You can republish it later when the content or access settings are ready. Unpublishing is different from merely closing the editor or deleting a preview link.
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For a rendered image of a URL you can access, ScreenshotNeo provides a website screenshot API and MCP server. It can capture a published Weebly address or an accessible shared preview URL; it cannot bypass a private login that the capture request does not possess. Before capture, it accepts cookie or consent banners and removes more than 60 known consent platforms, newsletter popups, and chat widgets, with each step independently switchable. Bot checks, CAPTCHAs, blank pages, timeouts, failed loads, and cache hits are not billed, and each response identifies the result with X-Page-Verdict and X-Billed headers.
Use the API documentation at https://screenshotneo.com/docs/ for authentication and options. The following calls use the documented endpoint and save the returned image.
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cURL
curl -G "https://api.screenshotneo.com/v1/shot" -d access_key=YOUR_API_KEY --data-urlencode url=https://yournamehere.weebly.com -o shot.webpPython
import requests
r = requests.get(
"https://api.screenshotneo.com/v1/shot",
params={"access_key": "YOUR_API_KEY", "url": "https://yournamehere.weebly.com"},
timeout=90,
)
r.raise_for_status()
open("shot.webp", "wb").write(r.content)Node.js
const q = new URLSearchParams({
access_key: 'YOUR_API_KEY',
url: 'https://yournamehere.weebly.com'
});
const res = await fetch(`https://api.screenshotneo.com/v1/shot?${q}`);
if (!res.ok) throw new Error(`Screenshot failed: ${res.status}`);
const fs = await import('node:fs/promises');
await fs.writeFile('shot.webp', Buffer.from(await res.arrayBuffer()));Replace the example address with the actual published or accessible Weebly URL. ScreenshotNeo supports PNG, JPEG, WebP, and PDF output; full-page capture can load lazy images, and options include device presets, custom viewport and retina scale, CSS selectors, custom JavaScript, click-before-capture, selector waits, delays, network-idle waits, request blocking, headers, cookies, user agents, Authorization, timezone, geolocation, transparent backgrounds, resizing, chosen cache TTLs, signed links, asynchronous jobs with signed webhooks, bulk capture of up to 100 URLs per call, and a usage API. Its MCP server exposes take_screenshot, get_page_info, and capture_pdf to Claude, Cursor, and other MCP clients.
Plans include 1,000 screenshots per month free with no card, then Starter at $5 for 3,000, Growth at $15 for 15,000, Pro at $39 for 60,000, Scale at $99 for 250,000, and Business at $249 for 1,000,000; yearly billing gives two months free, and every feature is included on every plan. Create a free ScreenshotNeo account to get the 1,000 monthly screenshots without a card.
Preview method: which one fits?
| Method | Best use | Important constraint |
|---|---|---|
| Editor Preview | Fast visual review while you edit, including phone and computer layouts. | Unsupported dynamic features still need separate testing. |
| Share link | Private feedback from colleagues or clients. | Recipients need the complete link and any required password. |
| Cloud Admin preview URL | Temporary collaborator access without publishing. | Documented validity is 30 days; unavailable from the User Portal. |
| ScreenshotNeo | Repeatable image or PDF captures, automation, and AI-agent workflows. | The target URL must be accessible to the capture request. |
Frequently Asked Questions
Does opening Weebly Preview publish my site?
No. Preview only renders the draft for inspection. The site becomes live when you choose Publish.
How long does a Weebly Cloud preview URL last?
Weebly Cloud documentation states that its temporary preview URL remains valid for 30 days.
Can I test a Weebly store in Preview?
No. Weebly Cloud lists Commerce among the features that do not work in preview sites, so use a controlled post-publication test process.
Can ScreenshotNeo capture an unpublished Weebly editor canvas?
Only if you provide an accessible URL, such as a shared preview link that does not require unavailable authentication. It cannot capture content confined to the editor interface itself.
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