hugo/docs/content/en/content-management/build-options.md

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Build Options	Build Options	Build options help define how Hugo must treat a given page when building the site.	build content front matter page resources	content management	docs parent weight content-management 70	true	70	/content/build-options/

They are stored in a reserved Front Matter object named _build with the following defaults:

{{< code-toggle >}} _build: render: always list: always publishResources: true {{< /code-toggle >}}

render

If always, the page will be treated as a published page, holding its dedicated output files (index.html, etc...) and permalink.

We extended this property from a boolean to an enum in Hugo 0.76.0. Valid values are:

never

The page will not be included in any page collection.

always (default)

The page will be rendered to disk and get a RelPermalink etc.

link

The page will be not be rendered to disk, but will get a RelPermalink.

list

Note that we extended this property from a boolean to an enum in Hugo 0.68.0.

Valid values are:

never

The page will not be included in any page collection.

always (default)

The page will be included in all page collections, e.g. site.RegularPages, $page.Pages.

local

The page will be included in any local page collection, e.g. $page.RegularPages, $page.Pages. One use case for this would be to create fully navigable, but headless content sections.

If true, the page will be treated as part of the project's collections and, when appropriate, returned by Hugo's listing methods (.Pages, .RegularPages etc...).

publishResources

If set to true the [Bundle's Resources]({{< relref "content-management/page-bundles" >}}) will be published. Setting this to false will still publish Resources on demand (when a resource's .Permalink or .RelPermalink is invoked from the templates) but will skip the others.

{{% note %}} Any page, regardless of their build options, will always be available using the [.GetPage]({{< relref "functions/GetPage" >}}) methods. {{% /note %}}

---

Illustrative use cases

Not publishing a page

Project needs a "Who We Are" content file for Front Matter and body to be used by the homepage but nowhere else.

# content/who-we-are.md`
title: Who we are
_build:
 list: false
 render: false

{{/* layouts/index.html */}}
<section id="who-we-are">
{{ with site.GetPage "who-we-are" }}
  {{ .Content }}
{{ end }}
</section>

Listing pages without publishing them

Website needs to showcase a few of the hundred "testimonials" available as content files without publishing any of them.

To avoid setting the build options on every testimonials, one can use [cascade]({{< relref "/content-management/front-matter#front-matter-cascade" >}}) on the testimonial section's content file.

{{< code-toggle >}} title: Testimonials _build: render: true cascade: _build: render: false list: true # default {{< /code-toggle >}}

{{/* layouts/_defaults/testimonials.html */}}
<section id="testimonials">
{{ range first 5 .Pages }}
  <blockquote cite="{{ .Params.cite }}">
    {{ .Content }}
  </blockquote>
{{ end }}
</section>