Use our update tool to move your site from version 7.0 to version 7.1.

Use our version update tool to update your website from version 7.0 to 7.1 without affecting your data. Site structure and information like SEO, orders, sales, customer data, members, domains, URL mappings, and subscriptions will remain intact. This tool is in beta, which means our team is still developing it.

This guide covers what to consider before you update your site, how to use the version update tool, and the feature differences between version 7.0 and 7.1. You can also sign up for an expert-led webinar on updating to version 7.1.

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Before you begin

There are a few important things to know before you use the version update tool.

• This is a permanent update - After completing the steps in this guide, you can’t revert to version 7.0. Take your time previewing and ensure that you’re happy with your updated site before you click Publish. Keep in mind that you can cancel the preview at any time.
• Your site might look different after updating - Not all version 7.0 pages and features exist in version 7.1. Carefully review the differences between the two versions in this guide.
• You should set time aside to preview the changes - Before you update your site, you can preview how it will appear in version 7.1 and make design changes. If your website has many pages, this may take a significant amount of time.

Should I update from version 7.0 to 7.1?

Squarespace version 7.1 is the most recent version of Squarespace. It has powerful new features and added flexibility such as site-wide animations, auto-layouts that arrange sets of content, and Fluid Engine, our latest content editing experience.

Any site on version 7.0 site can update to version 7.1, but the update tool is especially helpful for sites that have a lot of content, orders, settings, or domains. For sites without a lot of content or inactive sites, it might be faster to start over with a new site.

Not all version 7.0 pages and features exist in version 7.1. Before you update your site, review the differences between the two versions.

Step 1 - Prepare for the update

Before you start the update:

• Ensure your site is using a template in the Brine or Bedford family. You can switch to either of those templates from any of other version 7.0 templates. If you're unsure which template you're using, visit What's my site's version and template?
• The update tool has a limit of 100 pages. If you need to delete pages to reach that limit, you can duplicate your site to retain any content.
• Disable developer mode by opening the Settings panel, then clicking Developer Tools, clicking Developer Mode, and switching the toggle off. Note that any changes you've made on the Developer Platform will disappear. We recommend saving your site files and your Developer Platform code locally on your computer before you disable developer mode.
• We recommend duplicating your version 7.0 site in case you want a visual reference of your original design.
• Album pages aren’t supported in version 7.1 and will disappear after the update. To keep the content on these pages, ensure you have text and audio files saved locally to your computer. You can re-add images via your site's Asset library. You can re-add audio to your version 7.1 site using audio blocks. If you use an album page as your homepage, set a new homepage.
• Change the layout of any cover pages using an audio layout to one that doesn't use audio. Cover pages using an audio layout won't import to version 7.1.
• If you have sub-pages inside of index pages that contain info in their page settings, such as SEO descriptions and titles, that you want to save, move those sub-pages out from under their index page.

Step 2 - Start the update process

You'll start the update process to version 7.1 with a preview that can be canceled at any time. To start:

1. In the Home menu, click Website, then click Design, and then click Update to Version 7.1.
2. If the option to update doesn't appear, this means you're using an unsupported template or developer mode is still active.
3. Click Get Started and read through the information provided about the update. If your current homepage isn't supported in version 7.1, you'll be asked to select a new homepage.
4. Click Preview site in 7.1 to start your preview.

Step 3 - Preview your version 7.0 site in version 7.1

While previewing, you can only add content and make style changes to your website. All other site functions are disabled until you publish or end the preview. To cancel the preview and discard your design changes, click Cancel and then Cancel update.

To make most style changes in version 7.1, you'll use site styles rather than specific template styles. As you're trying out design changes, visit Making style changes to learn more about the differences.

Note: Keep in mind that while you're in preview mode, all contributors to the site will see the preview content and editing restrictions while logged in. You can cancel the preview and discard your design changes at any time by clicking Cancel.

Step 4 - Permanently update your site to version 7.1

When you’re ready to update your site to version 7.1, click Publish update. This can’t be undone.

Note: By clicking Publish update, you acknowledge and understand that Squarespace will update your site from version 7.0 to 7.1 and that you’ll no longer have access to the version of your site on 7.0.

Check your custom CSS

Custom CSS may be commented out after the update. To add it back in, remove the comment tags in the CSS editor:

1. Open the Design panel and click Custom CSS. 
2. If comment tags display, remove them. (Example: <!-- custom css -->)
3. Click Save. 

Keep in mind, if the custom CSS applies to elements that only exist in version 7.0, they won’t affect your version 7.1 site.

Step 5 - Start using version 7.1

After you update your site, try out these version 7.1 exclusive features:

• Page sections - You'll build your site's pages and footers with customizable sections stacked vertically. You can add, delete, and move sections to arrange your content.
• Fluid Engine - Use our latest content editing experience, which offers more flexibility for placing blocks in page sections on your site.
• Auto layouts - Use these layouts to automatically arrange sets of content in columns and rows, carousels, or slideshows.
• Make style changes - Use site styles to make the most of your style changes, including font, color, and spacing changes. Changes you make in site styles are usually site-wide, but you can make more fine-tuned changes by styling specific sections or text areas.
• Site-wide animations - Try out new styling effects for images.
• Section background images - Add background images to most page sections, and choose from a handful of image effects to create a visually striking website. 
• More powerful Commerce features - Add product waitlists, nested categories, and up to 10,000 products. Display Afterpay on product details pages and choose from several new product detail page layouts. Customize your store page with sections to create a visually striking store.
• Digital Products - Generate passive income by selling access to content like classes and seminars, audio or visual media, or community pages. Your visitors sign up for exclusive access to your gated content by creating an account and purchasing a pricing plan.
• Portfolio pages - Create stylized landing pages that link visitors to sub-pages. This is a great way to organize and showcase galleries, projects, portfolio highlights, and other content in one place.
• Create a multilingual site - Translate your site into multiple languages via our Weglot integration.

Differences between version 7.0 and 7.1

Some version 7.0 blocks, pages, and features don’t exist in version 7.1. Wherever possible, the update tool creates a similar design by moving your site content to version 7.1 equivalent content areas. Review this section carefully before completing the update.

Commerce

These commerce features have differences between versions.

Store pages

In version 7.1, product collections have:

• Nested categories
• New product detail page layouts
• The option to add content blocks to the product details page
• The option to place an Add to Cart button on the store page

Products

In version 7.1, products have:

• A limit of 10,000 per page and per site (vs. 200 per page on version 7.0)
• A limit of 250 variants (vs. 100 on version 7.0)
• The ability to import product tags and categories

Waitlists

In version 7.1, waitlists are available on all sites. In version 7.0, they were only available on some templates.

Afterpay

In version 7.1, Afterpay is shown on the product details page as well as checkout (vs. only at checkout in version 7.0).

Store pages

These store page features have design differences between versions.

Category navigation

In version 7.1, the category navigation: 

• Can’t be hidden.
• Always displays vertical lines between categories.
• Doesn’t display breadcrumb links.
• Doesn’t automatically include an “all” link. Instead, you can add a category called All to all products.
• Scrolls horizontally on mobile devices when the text is too long, instead of appearing in a drop-down menu.

On sale and sold out labels

In version 7.1, these display as text beneath the product’s price. There’s no way to change their shape.

Product hover effects

The fade and product info overlay hover effects aren’t supported in version 7.1. Review store page special features by version here.

Share buttons

These aren’t supported in version 7.1.

Blogs

These blog page features have design differences between versions.

• Share buttons - These aren’t supported in version 7.1.
• Sidebar navigation - Some version 7.0 sites support a sidebar navigation. This isn’t supported in version 7.1.
• Some engagement features - In version 7.0, visitors can like, share, and comment while authenticated. In version 7.1, visitors can only comment anonymously. You can add Disqus comments to your site for more flexibility.

Website headers

The website header has design differences between versions. To learn more about version 7.1 headers, visit Building a site header.

• Taglines - Header taglines aren’t supported in version 7.1 and will disappear after the update.
• Call to action - If you have a header CTA, you may need to recreate it by adding a button in version 7.1.
• Search bar - Header search bars aren’t supported in version 7.1 You can add search blocks to other areas of your site instead.
• Fixed headers - Fixed headers and other template-specific features aren’t supported in version 7.1.
• Page banners - Version 7.1 doesn’t have page banners. Images from version 7.0 banners will display in a gallery section at the top of the page in version 7.1. If you had a slideshow banner, the gallery section will use the Slideshow: Full layout. You can also make the version 7.1 header transparent so it displays over the image at the top of the page.

If your banner images don't appear when previewing version 7.1, try canceling the preview and deleting, then re-adding the banner image to the page.

Navigation

Secondary navigation isn’t supported in version 7.1. Pages in the secondary navigation will display at the end of the main navigation after the update. You can also turn them into a dropdown.

Bedford's sidebar navigation won't transfer to version 7.1, but you can manually recreate it on any page using linked text in a text block.

Pages and blocks that aren’t supported in version 7.1

These version 7.0 pages and blocks aren’t supported in version 7.1. With the exception of album pages, your content will display in version 7.1 equivalent content areas after the update. Review the table for more details.

 

 

Other feature differences between versions

These features aren’t supported in version 7.1. Wherever possible, we’ve noted similar options you can use in version 7.1.

FAQ

Do I have to move to version 7.1?

No. Updating your site from version 7.0 to 7.1 is optional, and you can stop at any time before you click Publish update. After you click Publish update, you can’t undo your changes or revert to version 7.0.

Can I undo the update?

No. After you click Publish update, your site will update to version 7.1 permanently.

Can I back up my version 7.0 site?

Before you start this process, we recommend duplicating your version 7.0 site. This creates a new version 7.0 website with the same site content and an identical design, which you can reference as you preview how your site will display in version 7.1.

Keep in mind, the duplicated site is a new Squarespace trial site. It won’t have any order data or analytics, and it won’t have the same domain. For more details about what doesn’t duplicate, visit Duplicating a site.  After you complete the update, you should delete the duplicated site.

Do I have to complete the update in a certain amount of time?

There's no time limit to the preview, but we recommend completing the update in one sitting so that you can access the site functions that are disabled while previewing version 7.1. If you cancel the preview without updating, any design changes you made during the preview will be discarded.

Will my commerce business be affected?

No. All SEO, products, subscriptions, settings, orders, analytics, and customer accounts will remain intact. Updating your site to version 7.1 using this tool won’t disrupt your business. While you edit your version 7.1 preview in the version update tool, your version 7.0 site remains live and can continue to accept orders. After you click Publish update, your version 7.1 site is immediately live. There’s no downtime.

Manually moving content from a version 7.0 to version 7.1 site

If you prefer to start from scratch and move all of your version 7.0 site content over to a new version 7.1 site, follow the steps below.

Step 1 - Prepare your content

Gather content from your existing site so you're prepared to add it to your new site. There's no one right way to do this, and it can vary depending on what you're moving over, but organize the content in a way that's convenient and makes sense to you.

• Copy text content - If your site has large amounts of text content, copy and paste it all into a single document or file so you can readily access it when you start building your new site.
• Save images - If you don't have the images you've uploaded to your site saved on your device, download them from your site. Organizing them into folders is a great way to simplify the process when you start uploading.
• Export products - If you're using Squarespace Commerce, you can export your products to a .csv and directly import them to your new site. It’s not possible to import other content, like pages, blog posts, or blocks.
• Note style settings - In site styles, take note of any particular style settings you want to preserve, like specific colors or fonts, as guidelines for your new site.
• Keep your current site active - We recommend leaving your version 7.0 site active until your new site is complete. This ensures you'll have access to your assets and visitors can still access your content while your new site is under construction.

Step 2 - Set up your new site

After you've prepared your content for the move, you can start creating your new version 7.1 site. You can import products as a .csv file from your version 7.0 site, but other content you'll need to recreate manually. There may be slight differences, but you can replicate most version 7.0 designs in version 7.1.

• Start a version 7.1 trial - Select a template to start a 14-day free trial. All version 7.1 templates have the same features and design options, so look for a template you like or one that's similar to your old site. While working on your new site, we suggest keeping it private. If you need more time at the end of two weeks, you can extend your trial. 
• Rebuild content - Click Edit in the top-left corner of the page preview to paste text content, upload images, and recreate blocks from your original site. Block sections use Fluid Engine, our latest page editing experience with more versatile design possibilities, but most page, block, and content options are the same, or have an alternative option.
• Import products - Add products to your store by importing products from your version 7.0 site. When you import, you don't have to manually recreate products. Keep in mind, if your version 7.0 site uses our classic product editor, version 7.1 store pages add a /p/ to the product URL between the store page slug and the product slug. Set up URL redirects so that customers with old URLs can find the new ones. To learn how to redirect multiple product links with a single redirect, visit our guide on URL redirects.
• Try new features - Explore new possibilities with features only available in version 7.1, like page sections, auto layouts, and portfolio pages.
• Style your site - Use site styles to set the font packs, color themes, and other style settings for your site. You can match fonts and colors to your previous site, or use the expanded options in version 7.1 to try new styles. Note that custom Adobe Fonts aren't supported in version 7.1.
• Set up SEO - Squarespace is well-regarded for our built-in, search-optimized design, but moving from one site to another can affect your site’s search ranking, no matter what platform you choose. To ensure your new site is optimized before going live, follow our SEO checklist and our tips on maintaining SEO.

Step 3 - Manage subscriptions

After your new site is ready to go live, you can upgrade to paid service and cancel your old site. If you have other subscriptions, like a custom domain or Email Campaigns, you'll need to take a few more steps to enable them on your new site.

• Upgrade to paid service - If you're ready to publish your site, subscribe to one of our current website billing plans and publish your site. New sites need to use one of our current billing plans. If your version 7.0 site is on one of our legacy billing plans, your billing options for version 7.1 may vary.
• Move your domain - You can move custom domains from your old site to your new site. The process depends on if you're using a Squarespace domain or a third-party domain. If you have a Google Workspace account associated with the domain, you can move it too.
• Check for other subscriptions - Check for any other active subscriptions on your current site. These can't be moved from one site to another. Follow the tips below to cancel these subscriptions on your old site and then subscribe again on your new site.
• Cancel your version 7.0 site - When your version 7.1 site is upgraded to paid service, you can cancel your version 7.0 site to avoid paying for multiple sites at the same time. If you had remaining time in an annual subscription, contact us to find out if you’re eligible for a prorated refund for switching sites.

Other subscriptions

• Email Campaigns - Cancel your Email Campaigns subscription on your old site and sign up on your new site. To move mailing lists, export them from your old site and import them to your new site.
• Digital Products - Before moving, consider these tips for migrating members. Then, sign up for Digital Products on your new site and cancel the Digital Products subscription on your old site. 
• Acuity Scheduling - What you should do with your Acuity subscription depends on how you're using it:
  • You can cancel your version 7.0 site subscription and leave the Acuity subscription active. This is a good option if you've got a complex setup that could be time consuming to build again. When you create your 7.1 site, add a scheduling block and connect it to your existing Acuity subscription.
  • You can cancel your Acuity subscription on your old site and sign up on your new site. This is a good option if you have a basic setup that could be quickly recreated or you need to use site-specific integrations like sending marketing emails to Acuity clients via Email Campaigns. To move clients and appointments, export them from your old site and import them to your new site.
• Stock images - To move stock images to your new site, you'll need to download them from your old site or from the image service directly. If they're premium images, your old site must no longer be published before you add them to a new site and publish that new site. You may only use premium images in connection with one Squarespace site at a time. Visit Searching and adding stock images for more licensing details.