How do I review Webflow work before it is published?

Review the staging link, not the live domain

Every Webflow site has a staging subdomain that ends in webflow.io. You can publish to that subdomain and leave the custom domain unchecked. The live site stays as it was, which is what you want while you are still checking. Ask for the staging address, open it in a browser, and do the review there.

The publish guide is the page for which boxes to check. This page is the review you do after the link arrives. Treat the custom domain as off limits until your written reply names it.

On plans other than Enterprise, a site manager can publish, and a teammate can publish when Can publish is turned on. A reviewer can look and comment. A reviewer cannot publish the site. You can finish this review without publish permission. You need the link and a reply. Enterprise plans can limit a role to staging, or allow both staging and production.

If someone already published to the custom domain, say that in the thread before you review anything else. The check below assumes the live domain is still the previous version.

Match the page to the written request

Open the note that asked for the work. Read the page, the outcome, and what done looks like. The brief guide is the shape of that note. The staging page should match it. A nearby improvement that nobody wrote down is not part of the approval.

Example: the request says to replace the first paragraph on /services with the approved text, and to check the layout on a phone. On staging, that first paragraph should be the approved text. The old sentence should be gone. The headline, the button, and the footer should still be the ones you had, unless the request named them.

If staging includes a new section nobody asked for, that is a hold, even when the new section looks polished. The extra section is a different request. Approve the paragraph only if you are also willing to see the extra section on the live site, and say that in the reply. Silence is not a way to accept half of a page.

Read the copy out loud once. A substituted word is easy to miss when the layout looks familiar. If the request attached a document, compare the staging paragraph to that document, not to your memory of the meeting that produced it.

Walk the path a visitor uses

Correct copy can still break the page around it. Check the parts a visitor actually touches, on a desktop width and on a phone width.

• Read the changed copy in both widths and look for overlap or a line that runs off the screen.
• Select each button and link in that section and confirm the destination.
• If the request touched a form, send one test from the staging page and label it, for example 'review check'.
• If the change is a CMS item, open the item URL and the list or homepage module that should show it.

Write a failed check as one line someone else can follow. 'On a phone, the new paragraph covers the button under it' is a hold the next pass can use. 'Looks off' leaves the page in the same state. Name the width you used. A desktop pass does not answer a request that asked for a phone check.

Also open one unchanged page, such as the homepage, from the same staging link. A site publish can include more than the page you discussed. If the homepage hero is different and the request never mentioned it, put that in the hold note before anything goes to the custom domain.

Reply with publish or hold

Send one written reply. Publish means the destination you name may be updated. Hold means that destination should stay as it is. Name the page. If you want another staging publish before the live domain changes, say that too.

A clear publish reply looks like this: 'Publish /services to the live domain. The first paragraph matches the approved text, the phone layout is clear, and the button still goes to /contact.' A clear hold looks like this: 'Hold the live domain. The second sentence is still the old copy.'

Keep the reply in the same thread as the request. A separate note that only says 'looks good' does not say which domain, and it does not say which page. If two pages were in the request, answer each one. You can publish one and hold the other.

Do not treat a quiet day as approval. The live domain should change because you wrote that it should, not because the staging link has been sitting in the thread.

Use the same check on later edits

Repeating edits are easier when one person already knows which address is staging and which address is the live domain. The Webflow retainer is the monthly plan for an existing site. The retainer guide explains what that plan covers. Use this page when a change is ready and you still need to say publish or hold.

Communication stays written. There are no calls or meetings to walk the page together. Your reply is the record of what you approved, and the staging link is the record of what you saw.