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Your changes save automatically as you edit, but they only reach your live site when you publish them. What happens when you publish depends on which branch you work on and whether that branch has branch protections.
Publish only appears when a site page is open. Private pages show Share instead and never publish. Viewers don’t see Publish. If there is no Publish button on a site page, your project has auto publish turned on and your edits go live automatically.If there is no branch selector, show the branch selector.If you only see your own changes in the Publish menu, turn on Show teammates’ changes to see everyone’s changes.If Request review appears in place of Publish on your deployment branch, your project requires review before publishing.

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Pending changes

On your deployment branch, the editor tracks the following as pending changes until you publish them:
  • Content edits in pages
  • New or deleted pages
  • Navigation structure changes
  • Media uploads
  • Configuration updates
Click Publish in the toolbar to see your pending changes. Click any changed file to compare it against the published version.

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What happens when you publish

  • Publish: Commits your pending changes to your deployment branch and deploys them to your live site.
  • Request review: On a feature branch, opens a pull request for the branch, or marks its draft pull request ready for review. On a deployment branch that requires review, asks teammates to approve your changes in the editor.
  • Merge and publish: Merges the pull request into your deployment branch and deploys it. Available once the pull request is ready or approved, depending on your repository’s review requirements. If your project requires review before publishing, only admins can merge into your deployment branch from the editor.
  • Create branch: Creates a new feature branch when you can’t publish to the current branch.
Only one publish can happen at a time per branch. If a teammate is already publishing to the same branch, your publish waits in a queue and starts automatically when theirs finishes.
Your live site updates after Mintlify builds and deploys your changes. This typically takes 30 seconds to a few minutes. The Publish menu shows progress as your changes commit, build, and deploy, then links to the live page. If the build fails, click View build log.

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Invalid MDX blocks publishing

If any page on your branch has invalid MDX, the editor disables the Publish and Request review buttons until you fix it. Hover over Publish to see how many pages have errors, then open each page in source mode to see and fix the error. See Publish button disabled because of invalid MDX for details.

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Publish specific changes

When several people have pending changes on your deployment branch, the Show teammates’ changes setting controls which changes the Publish menu lists. Show teammates’ changes off (default): The Publish menu lists only your changes under Your changes. That includes files you edited, files that you and teammates both edited, and files with no recorded author. Teammates’ other pending changes don’t appear in the menu. Each of your changes has a checkbox, and all of them start selected. Clear the checkboxes for changes you want to leave out, then click Publish. Only the selected changes publish. If you clear every checkbox, the editor disables Publish. Show teammates’ changes on: The Publish menu splits pending changes into Your changes and Modified by others. Your changes start selected, and others’ changes start unselected. Use the checkboxes to select which changes to publish. Each section has its own Discard button that applies only to the changes in that section. A contributors icon marks files that someone other than you edited. Hover over it to see who edited the file.
  • Selecting changes to publish only applies on a deployment branch without branch protections. On feature branches, publishing includes every pending change.
  • If your deployment branch requires review and your role can’t publish without review, the Publish menu shows only your own changes.
  • Deleting a folder deletes every page inside it. Those deletions publish together. You can’t partially delete a folder.
  • Some changes depend on each other, like a page and its navigation entry. If your selection leaves out a change that a selected change depends on, the publish fails with an error. Adjust your selection to include the dependency, then publish again.

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Work on a branch

Edit directly on your deployment branch if you don’t use a review workflow. Create a branch if each change goes through review before it reaches your live site. To create a branch:
  1. Click the branch name in the editor toolbar. On your deployment branch, the name has a Live badge.
  2. Optionally, type a title for your branch in Find a branch.
  3. Click New branch.
If you don’t enter a title, the editor names the branch after the current date. If you have pending changes when you create a branch, the editor asks whether to Bring them to this branch or Leave them behind. Your original branch keeps its pending changes either way. Edits on a branch you created in the editor, or on a branch with an open pull request, commit to the branch automatically, about 15 seconds after you stop editing. The first commit opens a pull request against your deployment branch. The pull request opens as a draft if Create draft pull requests by default is on. When your changes are ready, click Publish, then click Request review. After your pull request meets your repository’s review requirements, click Merge and publish. The editor merges the pull request and switches you back to your deployment branch.

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Manage branches

The branch menu lists your deployment branch, branches you created in the editor, and branches with open or draft pull requests, including pull requests opened outside the editor. Each branch shows its pull request status. To find a merged or closed branch, or any other branch in your repository, search for it by name. To list every branch without searching, turn on Show all branches in your editor settings. To rename or delete a branch, hover over it in the branch menu and click Rename branch or Delete branch, then confirm. Renaming changes the title shown in the editor and the pull request title. The Git branch name stays the same. Deleting a branch closes its pull request and permanently removes the branch from your repository, along with any unpublished changes on it. Viewers can’t rename or delete branches.

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Sub-branches

If your repository is on GitHub, GitLab, or Azure Repos, you can work on a sub-branch: a branch whose parent is a branch other than your deployment branch, such as a feature branch for a large update. A branch becomes a sub-branch when you create it in the editor while you’re on another non-deployment branch, or when its pull request targets a non-deployment branch. The branch menu lists sub-branches with open or draft pull requests, including pull requests opened outside the editor. Pull requests for sub-branches you create in the editor target your deployment branch by default. While a sub-branch’s pull request is open, the publish menu shows two buttons in place of Publish or Merge and publish:
  • Publish to <deployment branch>: Merges the sub-branch into your deployment branch and deploys it.
  • Merge into <parent branch>: Merges the sub-branch into its parent branch. Your live site doesn’t change until the parent branch merges into your deployment branch.
If you click the button for a branch that the pull request doesn’t target yet, the editor first changes the pull request’s target branch in your Git provider, then merges it. If the target can’t change, the editor shows an error and doesn’t merge. After the merge, the editor switches you to the branch you merged into. The list of branch changes in the publish menu compares your sub-branch against its pull request’s current target branch.

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Show the branch selector

If your deployment branch has no branch protections, the editor hides the branch selector while you work on the deployment branch. To show it, open a site page, click More options in the top bar, then turn on Branches. This preference applies only to you. The branch selector always appears when your deployment branch has branch protections or when you work on a feature branch.

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Resolve conflicts

When someone pushes to your repository from outside the editor, the editor merges their changes into the pages you have open. A notification tells you how many updates the editor applied. If a remote change and your edit affect the same part of a page, the editor keeps both versions and highlights them. Review the highlighted content, keep the version you want, and delete the other.

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Commit signing

Sign commits with your GitHub account by authorizing it in the Integrations section of your Profile settings. Without authorization, the Mintlify GitHub App signs commits made in the editor.

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Auto publish

If your project has auto publish turned on, the editor commits to your deployment branch about a minute after you stop editing. The branch selector and Publish button are hidden. There is no pending state and no review step. Auto publish and Require review before publishing can’t both be on. If an admin turns on one, the other turns off.