The Publish button is the moment a website stops being a draft and starts being something customers can see. It is worth knowing exactly what it does, and what it doesn't.
Two copies of your website
Every C Building website exists in two states:
- The working copy is what you see in the editor. Every change you make, by chatting with the AI or by clicking on the page, lands here first.
- The published site is what visitors see. It changes only when you publish.
This split is what lets you experiment without worry. You can rearrange your home page on a Tuesday afternoon, try three versions of the menu, and undo two of them, while your customers keep seeing the site as it was.
Your first publish
The first time you press Publish in the top-right corner of the editor:
- Your site gets its address. C Building gives every published site a free web address ending in .cbuilding.app, created automatically on your first publish.
- Your working copy goes live at that address.
- Your articles appear. News and blog posts you have published in the project's Articles section show up on the live site once the site is published.
On the Free plan, published sites show a small “Made with C Building” label. On Pro, the label is removed.
Every publish after that
Once a site is live, the button becomes Publish / Update. Changes you make afterwards stay in your working copy until you press it again. If you edit something and wonder why customers can't see it yet, this is almost always why.
A good habit: after a batch of changes, preview the site at different screen sizes in the editor, then update.
Adding your own domain
On the Pro plan, you can serve the published site from your own domain, such as www.yourshop.com. The simplest way is to ask the website AI to connect it: it checks where your domain's DNS is managed and shows you the steps that fit. If you bought the domain through C Building, it can set up the DNS records for you. If your DNS is on Cloudflare, the site owner can use one-click setup. You can also hand the domain's DNS over to C Building by changing its nameservers at your registrar. Or add the records shown under "Domains & publishing" yourself (a TXT record that proves ownership, plus A records) and press "Verify setup". New records can take from a few minutes to a few hours to take effect, and a nameserver change up to 48 hours. See put your website on your own domain.
When something goes wrong
- Roll back. Every publish is recorded. If an update introduced a mistake, the publish history lets you roll the live site back to the previous release, while you fix the working copy.
- Restore your working copy. If the problem is in your edits, restore an earlier version from the version history. See undo anything.
- Take the site offline. For a renovation, a long holiday or a rebrand, you can take the site offline from the editor, and publish again when you are ready.
Why we built it this way
Why not publish every change automatically?
Because a half-finished edit is still a change. Automatic publishing would show customers your work in progress. A deliberate Publish means the live site is always a version you chose.
Why does the free address come before the custom domain?
A domain has to point at a published site. Publishing first gives your website a live home; the domain is then connected to it.
Can I see the site as customers will before I publish?
Yes. The editor shows the site as it will look, and you can preview it at different screen sizes before you publish.
Wrapping up
Edit freely, publish on purpose. That is the whole idea behind C Building's Publish button: your customers only ever see a version you chose to show them.