Gated Publishing vs. Public Hosting: What's the Difference?
GitHub Pages, Vercel, and Netlify all work the same way: push a file, get a URL, anyone can view it. No authentication. No restrictions. The URL is public.
What public static hosting is
GitHub Pages, Vercel, and Netlify all work the same way: push a file, get a URL, anyone can view it. No authentication. No restrictions. The URL is public.
This is the right model for a lot of things. Open source documentation. Public marketing sites. Personal portfolios. API references meant for the world to read. If the audience is "everyone," public hosting is correct and free.
What gated publishing is
Gated publishing is the same idea — push a file, get a URL — but the URL is behind a gate. Access is controlled by company identity. Viewers authenticate with their Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 account. If the email domain matches, they're in. If it doesn't, they're blocked.
The result: a permanent URL that renders the full interactive page for anyone inside the company, and returns an authentication error for anyone outside.
When you need each
| Use case | Public hosting | Gated publishing |
|---|---|---|
| Open source documentation | ✅ | — |
| Public marketing site | ✅ | — |
| Personal portfolio | ✅ | — |
| Architecture proposal | — | ✅ |
| Internal competitive analysis | — | ✅ |
| AI-generated presentation | — | ✅ |
| Playwright test report | — | ✅ |
| Internal API docs (Swagger UI) | — | ✅ |
| Client-facing demo (public) | ✅ | — |
| Client-facing demo (confidential) | — | ✅ |
The decision rule: if any part of the audience shouldn't see the content, you need gated publishing. If the entire world can see it, public hosting is fine.
Can't you just use Vercel with a password?
Vercel offers two auth options above the free tier:
Password protection ($150/month add-on on Pro): A shared password. Not identity-aware. Anyone who knows the password can view — including people who've left the company, contractors whose access should have been revoked, and anyone the original viewer forwarded the password to. No per-user audit trail. No domain restriction.
SAML SSO ($300/month add-on on Pro): Identity-aware, real authentication. But $300/month per project for SSO is designed for a single, permanent application deployment. It's not designed for ad-hoc artifact sharing where you might publish dozens of files per month.
Display includes Google and Microsoft SSO at $49/month flat — for your entire workspace, all artifacts, unlimited viewers.
The gate is a capability, not a restriction
Gated publishing doesn't mean "always private." You can make any artifact public: the gate is something you control. An artifact set to public mode is accessible to anyone with the URL, no authentication required — exactly like public hosting.
The difference is that access control is a first-class feature. You decide, per artifact, who can see it. Public hosting has one access level: everyone. Gated publishing has two: authenticated viewers, or everyone.
FAQ
Can I switch a gated artifact to public later?
Yes. Access control is per-artifact and changeable at any time. Set it to public and remove the authentication requirement entirely.
Does the viewer need to create an account?
No. Viewers authenticate with their existing company Google or Microsoft account — the same one they use for email. No new account. No new password.
Is gated publishing slower than public hosting?
No meaningful difference for viewers. Authentication adds one redirect (five seconds, done once). After that, subsequent visits use a session cookie — no re-authentication required.
Free tier. No credit card. One-time password auth for viewers on free, Google + Microsoft SSO on Teams ($49/month flat).