Staged vs published media
Acrosite stages media in the app first, then commits the images a content item uses to your repository when it publishes. Learn how staged, active, orphaned, and published media differ.
Acrosite separates staged media from published media. Understanding the difference explains why an upload does not appear on your site immediately, and how images make their way into your repository. This page describes the model.
Staged media
When you upload an image, it is staged in Acrosite. Staged media lives in the project Media Library and is ready to be committed to your repository in a future publishing commit. Nothing is written to GitHub or your site at upload time — staging is purely inside Acrosite.
Staged assets can be:
- Linked to active content — used by a content item, so they will be committed when that item publishes.
- Orphaned — staged but not currently linked to any active, archived, or trashed content. These are safe to keep, but unused staged media counts toward your plan's media allowance, so you can remove what you no longer need.
Published media
Published media is media that has been committed to your repository and published to your connected website. In the Media Library, the Published Website Media view loads these on demand. Published originals live on your site, while Acrosite keeps the registry of what exists.
How media moves from staged to published
- You upload an image — it is staged.
- You use the image in a content item (in the body or as the featured image).
- When that content item publishes, Acrosite commits the images it uses into your repository's media folder and triggers a redeploy.
So an image becomes published as a side effect of publishing the content that uses it — not by uploading alone. See Where media lands in your repository for the exact paths.