The Design Editor is where you build your Vev projects. You’ll spend most of your time here designing layouts and adding content.
What you can do
Add, remove, resize, and style elements
Control layout and content
Create templates for the Content Editor
What you can’t do:
Create new types of elements or sections
Edit the code of existing elements
How to Open the Design Editor
Click a project on your Dashboard.
If you have Design access, it opens in Design mode.
If you're a Content user, it opens in Content Editor.
You can switch modes anytime using the “Design” icon in the bottom-left corner.
Understanding the Canvas
The Canvas is your main workspace. It includes the Viewport, which shows how your content will look on different devices (desktop, tablet, mobile).
Hover over elements to see their outlines.
Use Edit Mode to make changes.
Use Preview Mode to test functionality like links or videos.
Quick Tips:
Scroll to move up/down the page
Hold CMD/CTRL + scroll to zoom
Press 1, 2, or 3 to switch between Desktop, Tablet, and Mobile
Press P to switch between Edit and Preview mode
Hold SPACE and drag to pan around
CTRL + mouse wheel to zoom in/out
Edit mode, where elements and sections are selectable and editable. They are not fully functional in this mode, e.g. clicking links doesn’t take you anywhere and videos don’t play.
Preview mode, where web content is rendered with full functionality as it would in real life.
Open a project in the Content Editor and try out the following:
Scroll up and down to view the whole length of the page.
Zoom in and out by holding
CMD/CTRLand scrolling up and down.Hover over content to identify the different sections and elements.
Press
1,2, and3on your keyboard to switch between Desktop, Tablet, and Mobile.Press P to switch between Edit and Preview mode.
Adjusting the size of the Canvas
Placing & Selecting Elements & Components
Drag elements from the add menu to the Canvas.
Some elements (like images or videos) can be used as full sections.
Use the Pointer tool to select elements or drag to select multiple.
Selected elements are also highlighted in the Page Content panel.
Top Bar Navigation
The Top Bar gives you quick access to some of the most essential tools you need in Vev. Let's find out what some of these tools are for.
Cursor tools
Depending on your user type and access right, you will find all cursor tools in the top-left corner of the Canvas view. The following tools are currently available:
Pointer (shortcut: press V)
Pan (shortcut: hold space + drag your canvas — Design editor or admin-only)
Comment (shortcut: press C)
Components (Design editor or admin-only)
Next to your cursor tools, you will find the Components menu and shortcuts to some of the most commonly used components. Here, you’ll find:
Add menu, our no-code library of all elements and sections (Shortcut: Press M)
Section tool (Shortcut: Press K)
Text tool (Shortcut: Press T)
Image tool (Shortcut: Press I)
Video tool
Shapes tool (Shortcut: Press R)
Preview and Publish
The “Preview” and “Publish” buttons are located on the right side of the canvas view. Using the preview button, you can preview your content before publishing it anywhere, allowing you to test your designs beforehand.
You can publish your content (what you see in your preview) to either a staging domain or directly to where you would like to publish your content using the publish button.
Device Modes and Breakpoints
In order to see how it is currently looking at different screen heights/device modes, you can click the device modes or breakpoints that are located in the bottom left corner of your canvas view.
Using this feature, you can switch between the breakpoints in your project to see how your design looks on the different devices you want to design for.
Zoom and Refresh Canvas
You can find the zoom tool and refresh button in the bottom-right corner of the canvas. When you open the zoom tool, you will find the different ways you can zoom in on your canvas and the shortcuts for each control.
Page Content and Layer Panel
The Page Content Panel contains all the Elements on your Canvas. It’s built up of Sections where you can place other Elements freely inside.
If an item contains any other items, this will be indicated by the down caret/arrow icon. You can click this to collapse and un-collapse the content.
Double-clicking Section will make the layer name editable.
The Lock icon locks the layer, meaning the layer can't be edited
The Eye icon hides that layer from the current View Mode.
Helpful tips
You can hide a component from e.g. the tablet mode but will stay visible on desktop and phone view. Hidden components will not show up on the canvas or on the published page.
You can drag items in the Page Content Panel to arrange them. You can also right-click to open up a context menu with helpful commands, such as copy, paste, and a lot more.
Right-Side Panel
The right-side panel is where a lot of your customizations on your design will happen. Depending on your selection, you will be presented with different tab options in this panel; there are four different tab options available presented in sets of two; the Style & Addons Tab, Page settings & Project settings.
Style & Addons Tabs
When a section, any element or component on your canvas is selected, the style tab will be available in the right-side panel.
Style
Depending on what component you have selected, different styling options presented will be different. For example, below we have a section selected, and so we have the option to add padding to the top and bottom of the section.
Interactions
The Interactions tab allows you to quickly browse and apply different interactions to your selected sections and elements on your canvas.
Page settings
The page settings tab only applies to the page you are currently viewing. Here you can:
Set meta settings, such as page name, image, and description
Change the page status
Edit the page path
Copy the embed code of your page
Learn more about page settings here.