Choose website deployment around ownership and recovery

List the site’s actual functions before choosing a host: public pages, downloads, forms, sign-in, stored records or server-side processing. Separate current requirements from possible future features. Then identify who controls the domain, source code, hosting account and billing.

Compare the release workflow

• Build requirements, supported runtime and deployable output.
• Preview access, publication controls and team permissions.
• Custom domains, certificates, redirects and error pages.
• Version history, rollback, backups and migration options.

Netlify’s deployment documentation distinguishes preview and production versions and documents Git, command-line and manual deployment routes. Read the Netlify profile to investigate the route that fits your team. Confirm plan-specific limits rather than treating every deployment method as operationally identical.

Ask what happens after a mistake

Can a reviewer inspect the exact candidate before it replaces the live site? Does a source push publish automatically? How do you restore the previous working version, and what happens to any separately stored data? Check whether preview URLs are publicly accessible; a hidden link or indexing instruction should not be treated as access protection.

Include usage and maintenance

Estimate builds, traffic, bandwidth, functions, storage, forms and team seats where applicable. Confirm commercial-use terms, spending controls, overage behavior, support and domain-renewal costs. Include maintenance and recovery time, not just the advertised starting price.

Before changing DNS, preserve the complete current zone and identify email records. Test the proposed site’s pages, downloads, mobile layout, HTTPS, redirects and genuine missing-page responses. Keep an exact release record and rollback target. Changes to forms or analytics need their own data-handling review; hosting a page does not require enabling every add-on.

Use the buying checklist to record the chosen workflow and who can approve later changes.