Document Workflow
Learn how to control when your documents are visible to readers by switching between draft and published states.
Draft and published
Every document has a workflow state that controls who can see it.
Published is the default for new documents — they’re ready for readers as soon as you create them. (Duplicating a document is the exception: copies start as drafts.)
Draft keeps a document private to your workspace — only workspace members can view drafts, and they never appear to public readers, even if the project is public.
Published means the document is ready for readers. Who can see it depends on the document’s Document Visibility & Access Level settings. Once a document is published, the Access Level control becomes available on the Access tab; setting it to Public also reveals the Show in navigation toggle.
Note: Publishing documents from more than one project requires the Pro plan or higher.
Check the current state
The state appears in a few places: the draft icon in the document tree, the Status control at the top of the editor, and the Status field on the Access tab of the Share popover. It’s also listed under Document Info in the right sidebar.
Publish or unpublish a document
- Select the Share icon in the document top bar.
- Open the Access tab.
- Set Status to Published (or back to Draft).
Changes apply immediately.
Delete and restore
Deleting a document sends it — and everything nested under it — to the project’s Trash. Links to it stop resolving, and the document can’t be edited while it’s there.
Each row in the Trash says who deleted the document, which is usually the first thing you want to know about something that is missing.
Open the Trash from the bottom of the sidebar tree to see deleted documents and Restore the ones you need. Restored documents come back with their content, history, and place in the tree.
Restoring works on the whole branch: bring back a parent and everything that went to the Trash with it comes back too. That is the opposite of Archiving Documents, where each document is restored on its own — worth knowing, because the Trash lists every deleted child as its own row and it looks like the same one-at-a-time job.
If the original parent is gone for good, a restored document comes back at the top level of the project rather than disappearing. You may have to put it back where it belongs.
Delete from Trash is permanent and cannot be undone. Documents left in the Trash are removed for good after 30 days, and so is a deleted project — so a project deleted with documents still in its Trash takes them with it.
If the page is merely outdated rather than wrong, Archiving Documents instead — links keep working and nothing is lost.
What’s next?
Document Visibility & Access Level — Control navigation visibility and access level for your documents.
Archiving Documents — Retire documents without breaking links.
Document Editor — Write and format content in the Markdown editor.