Upgrade to Help Center 2.0

Who sees the upgrade

• Help centers created before Help Center 2.0 offer the upgrade. A help center you create now starts on Help Center 2.0 and shows none of this.
• Administrators see the upgrade and can start, publish or undo it, and so can members of a custom role with Manage account settings. Other agents do not see it.

Start the upgrade

1. Open Help Center in the main navigation.
2. At the top of the page, the card Help Center 2.0 is here lists what is new. Click Upgrade to Help Center 2.0.

That creates your Help Center 2.0 draft. Your visitors see nothing of it. You can hide the card with its close button; it then stays hidden in this browser, and the same button waits in the Settings tab under Help Center 2.0.

What the draft starts with

The draft starts with the look of your current help center: logo, brand color, favicon, fonts, theme and colors, title and subtitle, the sections of your home page and their order, custom CSS, and your footer and header. On top of that it takes the Help Center 2.0 template:

• the headline and the search on the left of the hero,
• Most read right after your collections and Still need help? at the end of the home page,
• the collections sidebar on article pages,
• Literata as the reading font of your articles,
• AI answers in the search switched on when the bot of your live chat inbox answers (see "AI answers and billing" below).

Work on the draft

While the draft exists, a bar on the Help Center page says Help Center 2.0 draft. Your current help center stays live until you publish. It has 3 buttons: Open preview, Discard draft and Publish.

• Changes to the look go into the draft: everything in the Design tab and the branding, fonts, theme, texts, header, footer and AI answers in the Settings tab. The preview in the dashboard shows the draft.
• The name, the address, the custom domain, the chat widget and the languages apply to your current help center right away. Both versions share them.
• Articles and collections are shared too. Edit them as usual: a change shows on your current help center right away and is part of Help Center 2.0 as well.
• Settings that only Help Center 2.0 has, such as the hero image, header links, the reading font, the support email and the home page sections Most read and Still need help?, become available as soon as the draft exists.
• The design history covers your current help center. It shows again once you publish.

Help Center 2.0 has new page markup. If you use custom CSS or your own header or footer HTML, check them in the preview and adjust them in the draft.

Preview on your real address

Open preview opens your help center in a new tab, on its real address: your-slug.deskwoot.com, or your own domain when it is active. Every page shows the draft, from the home page to collections, articles and search, with the band Preview of your Help Center 2.0 draft at the top.

• The link works for 1 hour. After that, click Open preview again for a new one.
• Only a browser that opened the link sees the draft. Your visitors and search engines keep seeing your current help center.
• Questions you ask in the search of the preview get real AI answers and count like any other answer.

Publish

1. Click Publish in the draft bar.
2. Confirm with Publish Help Center 2.0.

Your help center shows Help Center 2.0 to every visitor right away, with the look of your draft. What stays the same:

• your articles and their translations, and your collections,
• the address of every page, so links and search results keep working,
• your custom domain, your languages and your chat widget.

Deskwoot keeps the look of your previous help center for switching back, and the design history records the upgrade.

Switch back within 30 days

For 30 days after publishing, the Settings tab shows under Help Center 2.0 when you switched and until when you can switch back.

1. Click Switch back to the old help center.
2. Confirm with Switch back.

Your previous help center goes live again, as it looked before the upgrade. Your Help Center 2.0 design, with every change you made after publishing, is kept as a draft, so you can preview it and publish it again later. After 30 days the button disappears and your help center stays on Help Center 2.0.

Discard the draft

Discard draft deletes the changes in the draft after a confirmation. Your current help center stays as it is, and you can start a new draft at any time. A new draft starts again from your current look.

AI answers and billing

Your previous help center has no AI answers in its search, so it never uses AI conversations. Help Center 2.0 has them: when a visitor types a question, the bot of your live chat inbox answers from your public articles, with sources. See Fynn answers in your help center search.

• The draft switches the answers on when the bot of your live chat inbox is active. Without such a bot they stay off.
• Once you publish, a visitor's first answered question in a month counts as 1 AI conversation, and every further question from the same visitor that month as 0.25. Questions without an answer cost nothing.
• To publish without answers, switch them off first under Settings > AI answers. You can switch them on or off at any time later.

The upgrade itself costs nothing. All details of the meter are in AI conversations meter, overage, and auto-recharge.

Frequently asked questions

Do my visitors see the draft?

No. Until you publish, visitors and search engines see your current help center. The draft shows only in the dashboard and in a browser that opened a preview link.

Do the addresses of my articles change?

No. Every article, collection and search page keeps its address, on your-slug.deskwoot.com and on your own domain, so links from your website, emails and search results keep working.

Can I keep writing articles while the draft exists?

Yes. Articles and collections are shared by both versions. A new or changed article goes live on your current help center right away and shows in the preview too.

What happens to my custom CSS?

The draft starts with a copy of it. Because Help Center 2.0 has new page markup, some rules may no longer fit. Check the preview and change the CSS in the Design tab; your change goes into the draft, and your current help center keeps its CSS until you publish.

Can a colleague look at the draft?

Yes. Every administrator can open their own preview from the Help Center page. You can also send your preview link; it works for 1 hour.

Do questions in the preview cost anything?

Yes, when the AI answers are on. A question you ask in the preview is answered like on a live help center and counts toward your AI conversations: 1 for your first question in a month, 0.25 for each further one.

What happens after the 30 days?

Switching back is no longer offered, and your help center stays on Help Center 2.0. You can still change its look at any time.

Can I start over?

Yes. Click Discard draft, then Upgrade to Help Center 2.0 again. The new draft starts from the look of your current help center.

Why are some settings marked "Available in Help Center 2.0"?

They only exist in the new design, for example the hero image, header links, the reading font and AI answers in the search. Start the upgrade and they open up in the draft.