How to Publish a Google Site and Share It

While you are editing, a Google Site is a private draft. Nobody can see it until you publish. Publishing puts a copy of the draft on the web at an address you choose, and Google hosts it for free.

This guide covers publishing for the first time, making the site public, updating it afterwards and sharing the link.

Step 1: Preview your site

Before publishing, click Preview (the screen icon at the top of the editor). Switch between the phone, tablet and large-screen views and click through every page.

Look for leftover placeholder text, missing photos and buttons that still link nowhere. Close the preview to return to the editor.

Step 2: Click Publish and choose a web address

1. In the top right of the editor, click Publish.
2. Under Web address, type the last part of your site's address. You can use lowercase letters, numbers and dashes, for example bright-smile-dental.

Your site's free address will be:

https://sites.google.com/view/bright-smile-dental

Pick something short and easy to say out loud. If the name is taken or not allowed, Google tells you and you can try another. You can change the address later in the publish settings, but links to the old address will stop working, so it is worth choosing carefully now.

Step 3: Set who can view the site

In the same publish window, find Who can view my site and click Manage. A sharing window opens with two separate settings:

• Draft controls who can open the site in the editor. Leave this as Restricted unless you want other people to help edit.
• Published site controls who can see the live website. Set this to Public so that anyone on the internet can open it.

If the published site is left on Restricted, visitors will be asked to sign in and request access, which is the most common reason a new site "does not work" for other people.

With a work or school account, Public may be unavailable or the default may be limited to people in your organization. In that case your administrator decides what is allowed.

Step 4: Decide whether search engines can show your site

The publish window includes a Search settings checkbox labelled Request public search engines to not display my site.

• Leave it unchecked for a business, portfolio or any site you want people to find on Google.
• Check it for sites meant for a limited audience, such as a wedding site or a family event page. The site is still reachable by anyone who has the link.

Step 5: Publish

Click Publish. Your site is now live at the address you chose.

To open it, click the arrow next to the Publish button and choose View published site.

Updating your site after it is published

Edits you make after publishing are saved to the draft only. Visitors keep seeing the last published version until you publish again.

1. Make your changes in the editor.
2. Click Publish.
3. Google shows a side-by-side comparison of the published version and your draft. Check it, then click Publish to confirm.

This means you can work on a new page or rewrite a section over several days without visitors seeing half-finished work.

Sharing your site

To get the link, click Copy published site link (the link icon at the top of the editor), then Copy link.

Places worth adding it:

• Your Google Business Profile, so the site appears on Google Maps and in local search
• Social media profiles and link-in-bio pages
• Your email signature
• Business cards, flyers and invoices, as a typed address or a QR code

To let someone help you edit, use Share with others (the person icon at the top) and add their email address as an editor. This is separate from who can view the published site.

Free address or custom domain?

Every site gets the free sites.google.com/view/… address. You can also connect a domain you own.

Both addresses lead to the same site, and hosting is free either way. Many people publish on the free address first and add a domain later. The steps are in How to connect your own domain to Google Sites.

Unpublishing

To take a site offline, click the arrow next to Publish and choose Unpublish. The site disappears from the web but your draft stays in Google Drive, and you can publish it again at any time.

Troubleshooting

Visitors see "You need access". The published site is not public. Open Share with others, and under Published site choose Public.

My changes are not showing. Click Publish again. Edits stay in the draft until you do. If you have published and still see the old version, reload the page.

The Publish button is missing. You have view-only access to the site. If you are trying to use a template, make your own copy first: see How to copy a Google Sites template into your Google Drive.

Google updates its interface from time to time, so the position or wording of a button may differ slightly from what is described here.