🔎 What a preview URL means
If the address of an article uploaded in Website Studio includes the word preview, that page is Search Atlas’s public hosting link, not a private draft. Anyone with the address can open it without logging in, but search engines are told not to index it. It is not your public blog URL on your own website, and it does not replace the blog already running on your main website.
Sharing or bookmarking the preview address does not put the article on your own website, but the preview address itself is already public for a published project. Visitors and search engines should use the address on a domain you connect after publishing, or the WordPress address if you sync the site there.
📌 Preview compared with a live page
- Preview: Search Atlas’s own hosting link for the Website Studio site, meant for review and kept out of search results, but publicly reachable by anyone who has the link.
- Live page: the public address on your own domain or a subdomain, available after you publish and connect that domain.
- WordPress blog: a separate site. Publishing Website Studio on its preview link or on a domain you connect does not update, replace, or turn off posts that already live in WordPress. Sync to WordPress is a separate step, and it can add or update Website Studio pages on that WordPress site without editing or turning off existing WordPress posts.
You can keep WordPress as your main blog and still use Website Studio. Posts are not copied automatically, but you can connect the WordPress site and turn on Sync to WordPress to push Website Studio pages there. Until you do that or connect a domain, the two systems use different addresses.
🚀 Publish without buying a new domain
You do not need to purchase another domain if you already own the domain used by your main website. Connect that existing domain, or a subdomain of it, to the Website Studio site.
- Finish the article in Website Studio and confirm the preview looks correct.
- Publish the site or page from Website Studio. Publishing makes it live on its Search Atlas preview address; connecting and verifying a domain makes the public address on that domain live.
- Choose the domain you already own. To leave your current WordPress blog untouched, use a subdomain such as resources.yourdomain.com or studio.yourdomain.com instead of replacing the main site.
- Add the DNS records Website Studio shows you at the company where your domain is managed. DNS changes can take time to finish.
- After the connection is active, open the new public URL, not the preview link, and confirm the article loads.
Pointing the root domain (yourdomain.com) at Website Studio can replace what visitors currently see on that address, including a WordPress homepage. If WordPress must stay on the main address, use a subdomain or a domain you already own that is not serving the WordPress site.
📝 If the blog should stay on WordPress
Website Studio does not by itself edit posts that already live in your WordPress blog. To place the Website Studio page on that WordPress site, connect the site and use Sync to WordPress. If the live post must be an ordinary WordPress post, create or paste the article in WordPress and publish it there. The preview address is only for review, and anyone with the link can open it.
- Keep the current blog: publish on WordPress and leave Website Studio in preview, or unpublish the Studio page so two versions are not public.
- New section beside WordPress: connect a subdomain to Website Studio and link to it from your main site menu.
- Avoid duplicate pages: do not publish the same article on both the preview or Studio URL and WordPress. Pick one public address.
✅ Quick checks before you share a link
- The public address on your own domain does not contain preview. The Search Atlas preview address still does, even after you publish.
- The address uses your domain or chosen subdomain.
- The page loads in a private browser window without logging into Search Atlas.
- Only one version of the article is public.
If you need further assistance, open the chat widget in the bottom-right corner of the platform and type human teammate to be instantly connected with a member of our team.