# Start your first website

Begin from a template or a short description, choose the name and address, and reach the editor.

For: Everyone building a first website

## Template first, or a description first

From the Websites page, choose New website. The wizard has four short steps: your business (its name and the kind of business it is), choose a look, make it yours (colours, fonts and a logo, with a live preview), then create. Choose a look offers two ways to begin: pick a starter design, or describe the business and let AI draft the pages.

A template is the safer start when you want control. It is a finished, ordinary website with placeholder wording: eight designs covering trades, professional services, creative work, food, charities, portfolios and a simple launch page. Every part of it can be changed in the editor, and nothing about it says "template".

The AI route is quicker when you would rather react to a draft than start from a blank page. It writes the wording and lays out the pages from your answers, always as a draft you review before anything is used.

Walkthrough: Naming the website, then choosing how to start (Starting a new website)

1. **Four short steps**: Your business, choose a look, make it yours, create. The whole wizard is quicker than reading about it.
2. **The name people will recognise**: It appears in the editor, your workspace list and the browser tab, and the included address is made from it.
3. **Choose a look**: A starter design, or an AI draft from a description. Both lead to the same editor with the same rules.
4. **The licence**: The last step shows the spare licence the website takes, or asks which one when there are several.

1. Open Websites and choose New website.
2. Give the business name people will recognise, such as Your Company.
3. Pick a template, or describe the business for an AI draft.
4. Make it yours, then choose Create the website on the last step.

## Starting from a template

The template gallery groups designs by the kind of business they suit, with a preview for each one that uses your business name. Take the preview through every page before choosing: it is the actual design you will edit, not a photograph of one.

Choosing Use this look copies the template into your new website. From that point it is yours: pages can be renamed, sections deleted and every word rewritten. There is no connection back to the original template, and no way for a change to it to reach your site.

Walkthrough: Finding a template that fits the business (The template gallery)

1. **Browse by what suits you**: Categories group designs by the kind of business, from trades to food and hospitality.
2. **A template is a real site**: Every card opens the design with its pages, not a photograph of one.
3. **Preview before choosing**: Look at two or three pages at phone width. A design that needs no fixing on a phone is worth more than a clever desktop.
4. **Use this look**: The template is copied into your website and becomes yours: everything can be changed afterwards.

Note: You cannot swap to a different starter template later on the same website. If you quickly decide the look is wrong, start a new website instead and delete the first one, which frees its licence again.

## Starting from a description

Build with AI asks a handful of questions: what the business does, who it is for, where you work, the tone you want and any look you have in mind. Then it shows a plan of the pages it intends to write, which you can accept before it builds anything.

The draft arrives as ordinary pages in the editor. Prices, testimonials and statistics are left as obvious placeholders rather than invented, so the site never claims something you did not say. Check every page with Click through before publishing, and see the AI guides for how drafts behave everywhere else in the editor.

Walkthrough: Letting AI draft the pages from your answers (Starting a new website)

1. **Build with AI**: The same step, the other door: answer a few questions and the pages are drafted for you.
2. **A description, not a brief**: A sentence about the business and its customers is enough to start. You will refine it in the editor.
3. **Create the website**: The draft arrives as ordinary pages. Prices and quotes are left as placeholders rather than invented.

1. Answer the questions in your own words; shorter answers are fine.
2. Read the plan and press Build my website.
3. Take the draft through every page and replace anything the AI could not know.

## Every website takes a licence

A website is made on a licence, and the licence is its plan. The trial gives one licence, so the first website needs nothing more. On the last step of the wizard, the Licence box shows the spare licence the website will take, or asks which one when there are several, and the website takes that licence's plan.

If New website is greyed out, no licence is spare. Owners and admins can buy one from the note beside the button, and the wizard carries on once it is paid; the guide New website is greyed out has the other ways forward.

Walkthrough: The licence a new website takes (Starting a new website)

1. **Which spare licence**: With one spare licence the website takes it; with several, choose here. Its plan comes with it.
2. **Create the website**: The licence goes on the website, and the editor opens with a short checklist.

Note: A second website needs a bought licence, even during the trial.

## The name and address

The website name appears in the editor, in your workspace list and in the browser tab. The included address is made from the name, such as your-company.cubesites.site, and works from the first publish.

The address can be tidied in website Settings before the website is shared anywhere. Lower-case words with hyphens work best, for example your-company or your-company-plumbing. Your own domain can replace it later without changing anything else.

Picture: Starting a new website. The new website wizard. The address is made from the name and can be tidied later in website Settings.

1. Check the name on the last step before pressing Create the website.
2. Tidy the address in website Settings before sharing the site.

## Can I build more than one website?

Yes, with a licence for each. The trial covers one website; buy licences, as many as you need, and choose one each time you make a website.

## What happens if I pick the wrong template?

You can edit everything in it, or delete the website and start again with a different one. Deleting frees the licence for the new website. Templates cannot be swapped on an existing website.

## Related guides

- [Find your way around](/help/getting-started/find-your-way-around)
- [New website is greyed out](/help/troubleshooting/new-website-is-greyed-out)
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