Write in WordPress. Publish a site nothing can break.
You keep the editor you already know. Your readers get a copy of your blog with no login page, no database and nothing to update — on your own domain.
Your writing room
The WordPress editor, with your drafts, pictures and theme exactly where you left them.
It opens when you log in and switches off when you leave, so there is nothing sitting there for anyone to break into.
Only you can open thisYour published site
A finished copy of your pages on your own domain, with no login page and no database behind it.
It can be read, and nothing on it can be changed — except by you, writing and publishing again.
This is what readers seeOne button, then it is out of your hands.
- you log inOne Google sign-in. No WordPress password to remember, no second account to keep safe.
- you writeThe editor wakes up with everything where you left it: your drafts, your media library, your theme.
- you publishSealed makes a fresh copy of your blog and puts it on your own domain, all at once.
- afterwardsThe editor closes behind you. Your site stays up on its own, and there is nothing for you to maintain.
A blog, and no second job.
- The WordPress editor you already know
- Your own domain name
- One Google sign-in, nothing else to remember
- No plugin or WordPress updates to run — ever
- A site that stays fast wherever readers are
- Nightly backups of everything you have written
- Your writing exportable at any time, it stays yours
- A person to email when something is wrong
Sealed is for writing, and not much else.
Because the published site is a finished copy, anything that needs to run while a visitor is on the page does not work: a shop or checkout, paid memberships or logins, and built-in WordPress comments. A contact form and search can be added; a storefront cannot.
If you need those, Ghost or WordPress.com will serve you better, and I would rather say so now than after moving your blog.
The awkward ones first.
Is this really WordPress?
Yes — the real editor, your own theme, your media library. What is different is only what happens after you publish: your readers get a finished copy of the site instead of talking to WordPress directly.
Can I keep my plugins?
Plugins you use while writing are fine. Plugins that need to do work every time a visitor loads a page — live search, popups with logic behind them, anything with a shop or a login — will not run on the published copy.
What can't I do?
No shop or checkout, no paid memberships or reader logins, and no built-in WordPress comments. A contact form and a search box can be added. If one of those missing things is central to your blog, Sealed is the wrong tool and I will tell you so.
How do I leave?
You ask, and you get a standard WordPress export of every post and page plus a folder of your images — the same files any other WordPress host will take. Your domain is yours throughout; nothing has to be unpicked.
What if Sealed shuts down?
It is run by one person, so it is a fair question. You would get your export and at least ninety days' notice, and your published site would be handed over as plain files you can put anywhere.
What does it cost?
Nothing while it is invite-only — I am setting up the first blogs by hand. When there is a price it will be on this page before it applies to anyone, and leaving will still work the way it does above.
I kept paying for a server that sat awake all month so I could write a few times a month — and then spent my evenings installing updates on it anyway.
So I built Sealed. The editor only runs while I am actually writing, and what my readers see is a plain copy of the site that cannot be logged into, updated or broken. It has run my own blog ever since.
It is invite-only for now: I am onboarding the first blogs by hand, one at a time, so that the people on it get looked after properly.
— Alfred Westerveld