Sites basics

What can you do with the new Sites?

Build internal project hubs, team sites, public-facing websites, and more—all without designer, programmer, or IT help.

With the new Google Sites, building websites is easy. Just drag content where you need it. Create a one-stop destination for all important information, including videos, images, calendars, presentations, documents, folders, and text. Then, quickly and securely share it with an entire organization or the world.

What you need:

Google Workspace account & 10 minutes

1.1

Create your site

Choose one of these options:

• From the Sites homepage, click Create new site add.

• From Google Drive, click New > More > Google Sites.

Note: All Sites files are stored in Drive. For more information on using Drive to organize your files, see Get started with Drive.

1.2

Name your site

When you create a new site, a file is added to Drive, just like other Drive files. Sites automatically saves every change you make, but your site isn’t public until you publish it.

Name different parts of your site:

1. Site document name—Enter a unique name to keep track of your site. The site document name is only visible to you.

2. Site name—The site name appears in the header and in the web or mobile window title bar after you publish the site. You need to have 2 or more pages in your website for your site name to appear.

3. Page title—Each page in your site has a title, which appears at the top of the page. The page title also appears in the navigation menu.

1.3

Select a background image, header type, and theme

Choose a look for your site. Each theme comes with a preset background, color scheme, and font selection. You can adjust fonts, colors, and the background later, and you can always change the theme after the site is created. If you need to make any changes, click Undo undo, or Redo redo.

1. Change the background image:

   1. Go to Sites and open your site.

   2. Hover over the background image and click

   3. Change image image.

   4. Select an image from the Gallery or choose another image to upload.

   5. Click Select.

   6. (Optional) To go back to the original background image, click Reset refresh.

2. Change the header type:

3. Hover over the background image and click Header type .

   1. Choose an option:

      • Large banner

      • Banner

      • Title only

4. Change the theme and font style:

   1. In the top-right corner, click Themes.

   2. Select a theme option and choose a color.

   3. Click Font style and select a style.

1.4

Add, reorder, and nest pages

Add pages for more content. Keep related information together by nesting pages. Nested pages appear as a subtopic of another page.

1. Add pages:

   1. In the top-right corner, click Pages > Add page .

   2. Name the page and click Done.

2. Reorder or nest pages:

   1. Click Pages.

   2. Drag a page up or down in the list to reorder it.

   3. Drag a page on top of another page to nest it.

   4. (Optional) To un-nest a page, drag it to the bottom of the list.

3. Note: You can only nest a page one level, and you can’t nest the page that’s set as the homepage.

4. Choose page options:

5. Under Pages, select a page and next to it, click More more_vert to:

• • Set it as the homepage.

  • Duplicate the page.

  • Rename the page.

  • Create a sub page.

  • Remove the page from the site. You can’t remove the page that’s set as your homepage.

  • Hide a page or sub page. You can’t hide the page that’s set as your homepage.

1.5

Set up site navigation

Visitors to your site use the navigation menu to jump to different pages. By default, the navigation menu is at the top of your site. In the top-right corner, click your homepage to see the menu.

You can move the navigation menu to the left side if you want, but you need to have one or more pages on your site to change where it appears.

Change where the navigation menu appears:

1. Hover over the site name and click Navigation Settings settings.

2. Choose where to place your navigation.

3. To see the menu on the left, click Menu menu.

4. (Optional) To move the pages in the navigation menu, see Add, reorder, and nest pages.

2.1

Add content

Add content to your site:

1. On the right, select the page that you want to add content to.

2. Click Insert. Or, double-click on the page where you want to add content.

3. Choose the content you want to add:

   1. Text box—Add titles and text.

   2. Embed URL—Add photos, designs, and other images.

   3. Images—Add content directly from the web, such as music and videos.

   4. Upload—Upload photos, videos, PDFs, or other documents from your device.

   5. Components—Add a (horizontal) divider line to your page.

   6. Google Drive—Embed any file or the contents of a folder stored in Drive. If you make changes to your files in Drive, the same changes automatically show in Sites.

   7. Google Embeds—Add YouTube videos (such as product trailers or company ads), calendars (such as team or event calendars), and maps (such as office locations, event directions, or custom maps).

   8. Google Docs—Add anything from Docs, Slides, Sheets, Forms, or Charts to your site. Any content you change in the source file will automatically update on your site.

   9. Double-click on the page to add content.

2.3

Edit images

Resize an image:

Select the image and then drag the sides or corners of the image. Hold the Shift key while dragging to keep the image ratio.

Move an image:

Drag the image to a different part of the section or to a new section. You can place the image wherever you see a highlighted area.

Note: Currently, you can’t place an image in a text box.

Crop an image:

1. Select the image and then select Crop crop.

2. Slide the dot to zoom in or out.

3. Drag the image to change the visible portion.

4. Click Done done.

5. (Optional) To uncrop an image, click Uncrop crop_free.

Replace an image:

1. Select the image.

2. Click More more_vert > Replace image > Select image.

3. Choose a new image file and click Select.

Add alt text to an image:

Alt text appears when someone hovers over an image on your site.

1. Select the image and click More more_vert > Add alt text.

2. Enter a description and click Apply.

Add a logo

Logos appear in the top navigation bar, next to the site name.

1. Hover over the top of the page header and click Add logo image.

2. Click Upload file_upload or Select images image.

3. Select the logo and click Open or Select.

4. (Optional) To change the color of the page header, underBackground, click the Down arrow arrow_drop_down and select a color.

5. (Optional) To select a theme color based on your logo, in the Edit logo window, select a theme color.

Note: Logo files can be in .jpg, .png, or .gif format. For best results, the logo height should be at least 112 px.

2.4

Move and resize content

Anything you insert is added as a content “tile” on the canvas grid. Tiles snap to the grid so it’s easy to move, align, and edit them.

Move site content:

1. Hover over the content you want to move until you see Move open_with.

2. Drag the content to a highlighted area.

Resize site content:

1. Select the content you want to resize.

2. Drag the blue circles to resize.

3.1

Share and collaborate on Sites

Share a site:

1. Choose an option:

   • To share a site from Sites, click Add editors person_add.

   • To share a site from Drive, in Drive, select the site file and click Share person_add.

2. Choose people to share your site with:

   • To set permissions across your organization: Under Who can edit, click Change, select a sharing option, and click Save. You can then copy and paste a link to the site into an email or chat message.

   • To set permissions for individual people: In the Invite peoplebox, enter the names or email addresses of people in your organization you want to share your site with then, clickSend > Done.

3. Change people’s permissions:

   • To give permissions, click the Down arrow arrow_drop_down next to the person’s name and select a permission level.

   • To remove permissions, click the Down arrow arrow_drop_down next to the person’s name, and click Remove close.

4. (Optional) To restrict editors from publishing, changing site access, or adding new people, click the box next to Prevent editors from changing access and adding new people.

   • Click Save changes > Done.

Note: After you publish a site, you can share it by clicking the Down arrow arrow_drop_down next to Publish and selecting View published site. Then, just send the site URL to anyone you want to share it with.

4.1

Preview your site

If you’re viewing a site on a mobile device, the content automatically adjusts to fit the screen. You can preview how your site appears on different devices.

Preview your site:

1. Click Preview visibility.

2. To see how your site looks on different devices, choose an option:

   • Phone

   • Tablet

   • Large screen

3. Click Close close to exit the preview screen.

4.2

Publish your site for the first time

When you publish your site for the first time, add a site name to complete the site URL. You can only use letters, numbers, and dashes in the site name. The beginning of the URL includes your organization’s domain and can’t be changed.

Publish your site for the first time:

1. Click Publish.

2. Add a name to the end of the URL. Certain terms, such as support and admin, can’t be used.

3. Under Who can visit my site, choose who can see your site:

   • Anyone in your domain

   • Anyone on the web

4. (Optional) If you choose Anyone on the web and you don’t want your site available in public searches, check the Request public search engines to not display my site box.

5. Note: This doesn’t guarantee that your site won’t show in public search engines. It only requests that search engines do not automatically index it.

6. Click Publish. Visit your site's URL to confirm that your site published correctly.

Change who can see your published site:

1. Next to Publish, click the Down arrow arrow_drop_down > Publish settings.

2. Under Who can visit my site, choose who can see your site:

   • Anyone in your domain

   • Anyone on the web

3. Click Save .

Note: You can continue to edit your site after you publish it. However, you need to republish the site to see any new changes.

4.3

Change a site’s URL

You can change your site’s URL anytime. However, if you do, bookmarks to the old URL will no longer work.

Change your site URL:

1. Next to Publish, click the Down arrow arrow_drop_down > Publish settings.

2. Enter a new URL.

3. Click Save.

4.4

Unpublish your site

If you no longer want your site to be available online, you can unpublish it. You can still access and update your site content. You can also republish the site using the same URL or a different URL at any time. If people try to visit your unpublished site, they’ll see an error message.

Unpublish your site:

Next to Publish, click the Down arrow arrow_drop_down > Unpublish.