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Flex Forms separates editing a draft from releasing a live schema. Studio autosaves your draft continuously. Publish copies that draft to the published snapshot respondents see on the public Fill link.

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The Autosave Engine

In the top navigation bar, a subtle indicator reads Saving… or Saved. There is no manual ‘Save’ button in Flex Forms. Every structural modification, settings tweak, or design update is saved to the draft schema. Your work is never lost — and drafts do not change what public respondents see until you Publish again.
Draft vs published: Autosave writes the draft. Public Fill and embeds read the published schema. When they differ, Studio shows an Unpublished changes chip next to Publish.

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Private Previews

Click the Preview button to launch the form in a new tab as it exists in the draft.
1

Secure Token

Studio opens a temporary signed preview URL (preview=1 plus a signature). Only that link — or a signed-in Studio user with view access — can open unpublished drafts. A bare ?preview=1 without a valid signature does not unlock drafts.
2

Draft accuracy

Preview always reflects the latest autosaved draft, including edits not yet published.
3

Safe Functional Testing

Preview mode is a fully functional UI for testing multi-page flows, Logic, and payment fields. Submissions are not saved, and Stripe payments are not confirmed or recorded in preview — Publish the form to collect real responses and transactions.

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Production Publishing

Clicking Publish:
  1. Saves the current draft (if needed)
  2. Checks Flow health (criticals block; warnings need acknowledge)
  3. Copies the draft → published schema and sets the form live (is_active)
You can publish or unpublish from:
  • The Publish button in Studio (top bar)
  • The ⋯ menu on the Forms index (/admin/flex-forms) — Publish for drafts, Unpublish for live forms
Flow health: Critical Workflow issues (jump cycles, incomplete jumps, unreachable non-terminals, no reachable terminal) block Publish until fixed. Warnings appear on the Workflow Rules surface and require an explicit acknowledge (confirm) before Publish continues — criticals must be clear first.
Editing a live form no longer hot-deploys mid-edit. Respondents keep seeing the last published schema until you click Publish again.

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Form Unpublishing

Unpublishing is an instant, non-destructive kill switch. Accessible from the form’s ⋯ menu on the Forms index (or Studio publish controls), it immediately takes the Fill Link offline. Visitors see Flex Forms’ branded 404 page (HTTP 404) instead of the form.
  • Data Integrity: Unpublishing does not delete your draft, last published schema, logic, submissions, or historical insights.
  • Resumption: Publish again to restore the Fill link using the latest draft → published copy.
Autosave stores the draft. Publish copies that draft into the published snapshot and flips is_active so the public Fill link serves it. Until then, public traffic keeps the previous published schema (or a 404 if never published / unpublished).
The Studio’s autosave engine requires a cryptographically valid license check against your current hostname. If your domain is not authorized in the License Portal, the save will be rejected.
Last modified on September 7, 2026