Use your own website
Keep writing and sending newsletters in Paragraph while readers read your posts on a site you host yourself.
If you already have a website that shows your posts (built with the Paragraph API or any other way), Paragraph can send readers there instead of showing its own copy. Your paragraph.com address redirects to your site: each post to its page there, and your publication's home and archive pages to your site's writing page. Search engines follow the same redirects, so the search value of every link to your posts builds up on your domain.
You keep writing, publishing, and sending newsletters in Paragraph exactly as before.
Your own website is included with Starter and above. See Plans and credits. A publication can use a custom domain or its own website, not both. If readers see a custom design your agent built, they go to your website once it's verified, and your custom design stays saved for switching back.
Set it up
In Settings → Website, choose the Your own website tab and enter your website address, the page your publication's home and archive should go to, like https://example.com/blog.
Enter the post address: where each post lives on your site, using {slug} for the post's Paragraph slug or {id} for its ID. For example, https://example.com/blog/{slug}. Paragraph shows an example so you can check it.
Save. Paragraph shows a TXT record that proves the site is yours. Add it at your DNS provider: the name is _paragraph followed by your site's domain, and the value names your publication.
Choose Check again once the record is in place. When Paragraph finds it, readers start going to your site.
How posts find their page
Paragraph works out each post's address on your site like this:
- The post's Canonical URL, if it's on your site. Use this for any post whose address doesn't follow your pattern. For example, a post with the Paragraph slug
post-mythat lives athttps://example.com/blog/my-post. Set it under Review & publish → Canonical URL, or withcanonicalUrlin the REST API. - Otherwise, the post address, filled in with the post's slug or ID.
Before redirecting, Paragraph checks that the page exists on your site. If you publish before your site has the new post (say it rebuilds after publishing), readers see the post on Paragraph until your page is up, and the redirect starts on its own shortly after. Newsletter links keep pointing at paragraph.com, so they always work.
What stays on Paragraph
- Your subscribe page, so signups keep working.
- Draft previews and your publication's RSS feed.
- Each post's Markdown copy for AI assistants, which names your page as the original.
Paragraph also leaves your publication out of paragraph.com's sitemaps, since your site lists your posts itself.
To stop, choose the Paragraph website tab, then Switch to Paragraph website. Your paragraph.com address shows your posts again.