How to test a website before launch: a checklist you can run
You can run most of a pre-launch test yourself with your own phone, a laptop and free tools, and the checklist below is written so that you can. Testing is already part of every build we quote, from a single-page landing at EUR 600 to 900 to a business website at EUR 1.500 to 3.500, so you should not be paying for testing on top. This list is how you check the work, ours or anyone's, before your name goes on it.
What a developer tests, and what only you can
A studio tests whether the site works: pages load, layouts hold on different screens, forms submit. What a developer cannot judge is whether the site is right. The phone number might be an old one. A price might be one you have since changed. The form might deliver to an inbox nobody reads. Those checks need someone who knows the business, and that is you.
The checklist
Work through it on the preview address before launch. On launch day, run the first two groups again on the real domain, plus the noindex check, because some things only change when the domain does.
1. On your phone, not your laptop
- Open every page on your own phone and scroll to the bottom of each one.
- Tap every button and menu item with your thumb. Anything hard to hit, or that opens the wrong thing, goes on the list.
- Check that no text runs off the edge of the screen.
- Repeat the home and contact pages on a borrowed phone of a different make.
2. Forms and the ways people reach you
- Submit every form with real details and confirm the message lands in the inbox you actually check, not in spam.
- Submit it again with a required field empty and an email address missing its @. The form should say what is wrong in plain words.
- Tap the phone number, email address and street address. Each should open the right app with the right details filled in.
3. Words, numbers and facts
- Read every page aloud, slowly. Reading aloud catches the missing words your eye skips over.
- Check prices, opening hours, addresses, names and company registration details against your own records.
- Search the pages for leftover placeholder text, such as "lorem ipsum", "TBC" or "example.com".
4. Links and navigation
- Click every link in the menu and footer, including the social icons.
- Type a made-up address after your domain, such as /this-page-does-not-exist. You should get a helpful "page not found" page, not a blank screen.
- If the new site replaces an old one, try the old page addresses that people bookmark or other sites link to. Each should redirect to the matching new page.
5. Search basics
- Look at the browser tab on each page: every page should have its own title.
- On launch day, right-click the home page, choose "View page source" and search for "noindex". On the live site you want to find nothing. The preview address is hidden from search engines on purpose, and that setting must not follow the site to your real domain.
- If you have Google Search Console, submit the sitemap and use URL inspection on the home page for the definitive answer on indexing.
6. Speed and accessibility, with free tools
- Run the home page and the page you most want people to reach through Google PageSpeed Insights. Read the mobile result and ask about anything marked red.
- Move through a page using only the Tab key. You should always see where you are and be able to reach every link and button.
7. Cookies and privacy
- If a cookie banner appears, decline, then browse a few pages. The banner should not keep coming back, and declining should be as easy as accepting.
- Check that the privacy page names your business and says what your forms collect.
8. Step 04 sites only: accounts and payments
- Create an account, log out, reset the password and log back in.
- Run a payment in the payment provider's test mode, refund it, and read the receipt and order emails.
- Log in as each type of user, such as customer and admin, and confirm each sees only what they should.
This is part of why an advanced site or web app is EUR 3.500 to 7.500 and 6 to 12 weeks. Every login, role and payment route is another path that has to be tested, and a mistake on one costs more than a typo.
What blocks launch and what can wait
| What you found | Decision |
|---|---|
| Form messages not arriving | Blocks launch |
| Wrong phone number, price or address | Blocks launch |
| Old page addresses not redirecting | Blocks launch |
| A login or payment route failing on a step 04 site | Blocks launch |
| "noindex" still on the live domain | Fix on launch day |
| A button that is awkward to tap on one phone | Fix soon after launch |
| A red score in PageSpeed Insights | Ask first, because the fix depends on the cause |
| Wording you would like to improve | Note for later |
Send your findings as one list, with the page address, the device and a screenshot for each item. One list can be fixed in one pass.
Where testing sits in the timeline
Testing happens inside each step's week range, not after it.
- Step 01, single-page landing: 1 to 2 weeks.
- Step 02, mini-site of 2 to 3 pages: 2 to 3 weeks.
- Step 03, business website of 4 to 7 pages: 3 to 6 weeks.
- Step 04, advanced site or web app: 6 to 12 weeks, including the account and payment checks above.
Your review of the preview is the part that waits on you. The ranges assume you run the checklist once the preview is ready and send back one list, so if the review sits unread, the launch date moves with it. You can see what each step includes, side by side.
When to spend less
You do not need a testing company, a paid device lab or monitoring software to launch a small site. For steps 01 to 03, your own phone, one borrowed phone, a laptop and the free tools named above cover what matters. Nor do you need to test every browser, because functional QA on the agreed browsers is part of the build.
Match the effort to what can go wrong. A landing page that collects enquiries needs its form tested properly and not much else. A site where money moves or accounts exist, at step 04, deserves more time and a second person running the checks.
Questions buyers ask
How do I test the contact form without filling my inbox with junk?
Use your real details and start each message with "TEST" so the submissions are easy to find and delete. A handful is enough. You are checking that each one arrives at the right address with every field intact, and that pressing reply goes to the email address the visitor typed.
Should the site be visible to Google while we test?
No. The preview address should be hidden from search engines, so an unfinished copy of your site is never indexed. The risk flips on launch day, when that setting has to come off the real domain. Setting up Search Console and checking indexation properly is part of the SEO foundation, a one-off at EUR 450 to 750.
What happens if I find a problem after launch?
Write it down the same way: page, device, screenshot. A fault in something scoped and agreed is different from a change of mind after seeing the live site, and a fixed quote follows scoping so both sides have a written record of what finished means. Every build includes 14 days of support on launch defects, and beyond that small fixes are what Care covers, at EUR 100 to 300 a month, while new features and redesigns are separate work.
Who on my side should run the checklist?
Two people if you can: one who knows every fact on the site and one who has never seen it. The first catches the wrong price and the outdated address. The second gets lost in places you no longer notice, which is what a first-time visitor will do too.
If you want a site built and tested against this list before it goes live, tell us what you are launching.
Building something?
JP Studio designs and builds websites, storefronts and product interfaces.