What a downgrade freezes

A downgrade deletes nothing. Whatever is over your new limit becomes read only. It still opens, it still exports, and its published page keeps serving your readers. You choose what stays editable, and an upgrade unlocks everything again immediately.

What read only means

A frozen manual carries a Read only badge on its card, and the editor opens with This manual is read only: the plan no longer covers it. It still opens and exports, and its public page is unchanged. An edit attempted anyway is refused with This is frozen because your plan does not cover it. Nothing has been deleted.

Your first 14 days

For 14 days after your account first holds more than the plan covers, nothing is frozen. Everything stays editable and every member keeps their role. A banner at the top of the dashboard says Nothing has changed yet and gives the date your choice is due. After that date the banner tells you which items are now read only.

What can freeze

Three limits can put something over the line: brands, manuals and people. Going over the storage limit does not freeze anything; it only refuses new uploads.

If a whole brand is frozen, everything inside it is already read only, so its manuals are not counted against the manual limit as well.

Which items stay editable

If you make no choice, the items are ordered like this and everything down to your plan limit stays editable:

1. What you chose, in the order you put it.
2. Then everything else, most recently changed first.

For a brand, "most recently changed" means the most recent edit to any manual inside it. A brand with no manuals yet uses the date it was created, so a brand you made this morning is not treated as your oldest.

Choosing what stays editable

WhereDashboard, Settings, Active brands and manuals

1. Open Settings (opens in a new tab), or press Choose what stays active on the banner or on any frozen manual card.
2. Tick what you want to keep editable under Brands you own or under Manuals in that brand. A counter beside the heading shows how many you have picked against the limit, and the boxes stop accepting ticks at the limit.
3. Anything left unticked is labeled Read only in the list as you go.
4. Press Save choice. The change takes effect immediately, and you can redo it as often as you like.

The chooser appears only when something is actually over a limit. Picking fewer than the limit costs you nothing: any place you leave unfilled goes to the most recently edited item.

People over the limit

Nobody is removed from a brand by a downgrade. A seat over the limit is set to Viewer and its old role is remembered, so an upgrade hands it straight back.

• The owner always keeps their role, and still counts against the limit.
• Otherwise the newest joiners lose their role first.
• Somebody already on Viewer keeps their seat as it is.
• Nothing happens during the first 14 days. Everybody keeps the role they had.
• Inviting is refused while a brand is at or over its member limit, and while the brand is frozen. Invitations nobody has accepted yet count against the limit; expired ones do not.

What still works on a frozen manual

Your published page never freezes

A downgrade never takes a published brand hub off the internet. The hub and every published manual serve as before, at the same addresses, with search, the table of contents and the print view. The read only API keeps answering at the rate the brand's current plan allows, and the PDF and design token exports keep working. See the API documentation (opens in a new tab), The manual as a PDF and Design tokens.

What else changes on a smaller plan

Features already switched on generally keep working. Switching them on again later needs the plan that includes them.

Which plan includes what:

Four ways back under the limit

• Choose differently. Free, and you can redo it whenever you like.
• Delete something. A frozen manual can still be deleted, and deleting a brand frees a place straight away. Both are permanent, so read Brands, manuals and how they fit together first.
• Hand a brand over. The brand then counts against the new owner's plan instead of yours. The receiving account needs room. See Handing a brand over, moving a manual, leaving.
• Upgrade. Everything unlocks at once and parked roles come back. See Paying, yearly, invoices and canceling.

A failed payment is not a downgrade

A card that fails puts your subscription into Payment failed, retrying, and you keep your plan for the whole of that. Only when the retries are exhausted does the account fall to Free, and then your 14 days begin.

If you cancel on purpose, everything keeps working until the end of the period you already paid for. In both cases nothing is deleted.

Common questions

Where to go next

• What each plan includes for the numbers on each plan.
• Paying, yearly, invoices and canceling for what a plan change costs and when.
• Billing (opens in a new tab) for what your account is using against each limit right now.