Documentation

Portal Branding

Make the documentation portal yours: choose a theme, set brand colors and fonts, upload your logo and favicon, and layer on custom CSS. All branding applies to the published portal and is configured per documentation portal.

Open Documentation Settings → Public Portal → Appearance and click Open Theme Editor in the Theming card. (The Appearance tab, like every tab but Publish, only appears once the portal is enabled.) The editor is split-screen: settings on the left, a live preview on the right that updates as you change values. Click Save in the header to apply — changes take effect on the next portal build.

The theme editor with settings on the left and the live preview on the right

Branding assets

The Branding section uploads your portal identity assets. Each asset has Upload/Replace and Remove buttons with an inline preview:

Asset Guidance
Logo Shown in the portal header in light mode, and as the fallback. SVG or PNG recommended.
Logo (Dark Mode) Optional. Shown when the portal is in dark mode. Falls back to Logo if unset.
Favicon Shown in the browser tab. SVG, PNG or ICO, square.
OG Image Social-media preview when docs are shared. 1200×630 PNG or JPG.

The same section also sets two header options:

  • Logo position — Left (logo leading, nav in the middle) or Centered (logo centered, nav on the left).
  • Logo link — where the header logo links to. Leave empty for the docs homepage.

Themes

Pick one of nine pre-built themes; each swatch shows its primary, accent, and background colors:

Theme Style
Clean Crisp minimal design, airy spacing
Developer Dark-first, built for dev tools
Enterprise Corporate, structured layout
Modern Playful with gradients
Classic Traditional docs, serif body text
Clay Warm terracotta on cream
Routebase Slate × Sage brand theme
Maple Warm paper tones, amber accent
Mono Monochrome minimalism, ink on white

Layout

  • API Navigation — how a spec's reference is split into pages: Per endpoint (one page per endpoint, the default), Per folder (one page per tag/folder with stacked endpoints), or Single page (the whole spec on one scrollable page). Choosing Per folder reveals a Folder landing option — Endpoint overview list or Folder description only — for what each folder page shows above its endpoints. A Previous / next links switch adds reading-order navigation at the end of API pages.
  • Layout Width — Centered (fixed-width column with side whitespace) or Full width (navigation far-left, "on this page" far-right).
  • Page Eyebrow — what appears above each page title: Section (the parent group name) or Breadcrumbs (the full breadcrumb trail with links).

Custom colors

Override the theme's Primary Color, Accent Color, and Background Color with your brand palette. Enter a 3- or 6-digit hex value or use the color picker; a reset button returns each color to the theme default. Leaving a field empty keeps the theme's own color.

Background

Add a subtle decorative background to the portal pages. Choose a Background decoration — None (plain background color), Gradient (soft primary glow from the top), Grid (subtle blueprint line grid), or Windows (diagonal glass panes). You can also upload a full-page Background Image, with an optional Background Image (Dark Mode) variant; an uploaded image takes precedence over the decoration.

Code Blocks

Choose the syntax-highlighting theme for code blocks from a curated set; each option shows a color swatch. One theme applies in both light and dark mode.

Typography

Two font slots, each with a searchable Google Fonts picker and live font preview:

  • Body Font — the body font (choices include Inter, Roboto, Open Sans, Lato, Poppins, Montserrat, DM Sans, and more).
  • Code Font Family — the monospace font for code (JetBrains Mono, Fira Code, Source Code Pro, IBM Plex Mono, and more).

A Body Weight selector sets the body text weight (Light through Extrabold, or Theme default).

Prefer your own typeface? Use the upload button next to either picker to add a custom WOFF2 font; it replaces the Google Font selection until you remove it. Choose Use theme default in the picker to clear a selection.

Headings

Headings can take their own Heading Font and Heading Weight, both defaulting to the body font and weight.

Font Size

Two sliders scale text independently: Base Text Size (12–22 px) and Heading Scale (75–150%). Each shows Default until you move it, with a reset control to return to the theme default.

Customize Surfaces

Beyond the theme-wide colors, the Customize Surfaces section styles individual portal surfaces (headers, sidebars, cards, and so on) with per-surface, per-property overrides for light and dark mode. You can expand a surface group to edit it directly, or click an element in the Customize preview on the right to jump straight to its controls.

Theme selection and custom colors with the font picker open

Dark mode

The Enable dark mode switch turns on a dark appearance for the portal. When it's on, two more controls appear:

  • Show the light/dark toggle — whether readers get a toggle to switch appearance themselves. Turn it off for a strict single-appearance portal.
  • Default appearance — Match system, Light, or Dark. With the toggle shown, this is what first-time visitors see before they switch; with the toggle hidden, it's the appearance every visitor gets.

The theme editor preview lets you check both modes before saving.

Custom CSS

For fine-grained control beyond the theme editor, use the Custom CSS card on Documentation Settings → Public Portal → Appearance — directly below Theming, with a live preview of your rules beside the editor. The editor has CSS syntax highlighting, a character limit of 50,000, warnings for potentially problematic selectors, and a built-in reference of the portal's CSS variables — colors (--rb-primary, --rb-background, --rb-text, …), layout (--rb-header-bg, --rb-sidebar-bg, …), and typography (--rb-font-family, --rb-code-font-family, …). Your rules load after the generated theme, so they win specificity ties.

On the Pro plan and above, the Hide Routebase Branding toggle on Public Portal → Features removes the "Powered by Routebase" footer from your portal.

Custom domains

You can serve the portal on a domain you own. The Custom Domain card on Public Portal → Publish — directly below the portal subdomain — walks you through entering your domain, adding the CNAME and TXT DNS records, verifying DNS, and provisioning an SSL certificate; once active it also monitors DNS and SSL health. Custom domains are a Pro/Enterprise feature — see Custom Domains for the full setup. Without a custom domain, your portal is served on its portal subdomain.