New Squarespace Features to Try Out: My Favorite Updates in Q1 of 2023
One of the reasons why Squarespace is my favorite website builder is because the platform is constantly being updated. We’re only a few months into 2023, but there are already a lot of new features to try out!
Before you get too excited, just know that some of these new features are still in beta and are only available for Squarespace Circle members. Others are only available for Squarespace 7.1 websites, and may not be an option if you are still using Squarespace 7.0. Lastly, the e-commerce features will only be available if you have an e-commerce plan.
So, what’s new at Squarespace in 2023?
More than I can fit into this blog post, that’s for sure! So I’ve picked out my top 8 updates/new features that you should know about:
You can click on any of these links to jump ahead to the details for each update.
New image overlays + effects in Fluid Engine
Image overlay effects in ‘blend mode’
Image overlays in Squarespace are nothing new. But what is new is a whole list of overlay effects available in Fluid Engine. Plus, some of the background image effects can now be applied to regular image blocks.
Blend mode: If you use image overlays, you’ll definitely want to try out the new blend mode! When you switch on the toggle to add an image overlay, you will see blend mode show up as a new option. When you click on blend mode, you can choose from a long list of overlay effects.
Image block effects: You probably are already aware that Squarespace offers animated effects for section backgrounds. But now you can use those animations with regular image blocks too! The five new image effects include liquid, film grain, parallax, circles, and lines. For each, you can adjust the animation speed and intensity.
Justified text
It used to be that you had to use custom code to justify text in Squarespace. Although, to be honest, it rarely looked good. Previous to Fluid Engine’s release, it was much harder to control text block sizes. In most cases, using justified text wouldn’t result in a pretty text layout, especially not for both desktop and mobile screen sizes.
But, now that it’s much easier to create text boxes that are exactly the size you want, it makes sense that more designers would want to use justified text. Squarespace recently added justified text to the paragraph formatting options, so you no longer have to use code. Although…I still wouldn’t advise that you use justified text very often.
Updated order status page + order tracking
If you use custom code on your site, this update may be more hassle than help. Squarespace changed the order status page after checkout, adding more details on the product fulfillment status. So you might need to update any code you used on your order status page.
But for e-commerce sites that primarily ship in the United States using USPS, it’s now much easier for customers to track their orders. As long as you purchase your USPS labels through Squarespace, the order tracking timeline will show up right on the Squarespace order status page. So far this feature is only available for USPS, but it might eventually extend to other shipping carriers.
Section dividers
This is probably the update I’m most excited about!
For a long time, I’ve been adding custom code to create slanted sections in Squarespace. Now, it’s as easy as clicking a few buttons, because Squarespace recently added a feature for styling the bottom of each section. You can create slanted sections, curved sections, jagged sections…whatever you’re in the mood for!
Just click “Edit Section” for the section you want to change, and scroll down to the bottom of the pop-up. There, you can turn on the section divider and toggle through a variety of shapes, styles, and border colors.
settings to style section dividers
More video playback settings
When Fluid Engine was first released, you could no longer autoplay or loop uploaded videos. The only way to autoplay or loop videos was to embed them from YouTube or another video streaming platform. You can click here to watch my tutorial on embedding autoplay videos.
Honestly, that’s still probably the best way to do it, since Squarespace only allows you to upload a total of 30 minutes of video for your entire site…
However, Squarespace did recently add to their video playback settings. Now you can once again mute, autoplay, or loop videos that are directly uploaded to your website. As long as they’re short so that you don’t run out of your video storage, it should work just fine.
Discounts in Email Campaigns
I’ve mentioned this before in my tutorials, but Squarespace Email Campaigns is a pretty basic email marketing platform. I recently published a blog post about setting up newsletters in Squarespace, where I cover several of my favorite email alternatives.
But if you regularly offer discounts on your products, it might pay off to stick with Email Campaigns. Squarespace updated their email campaign builder to include a discount section. This means you can directly add an active discount or create a new discount right inside the email builder! This makes it a lot easier for customers to purchase products featured in your sales emails.
Product variant buttons
Product variants are basically any options you offer for a product, such as different colors or sizes. By default, variants are displayed on your product page in dropdown boxes. For example, if a customer clicked on “Size,” it would open a dropdown box with all the size options.
Now, however, you can display your product variants using buttons instead. To reuse the previous example, your size options will show up in a row of buttons next to the product, instead of a dropdown.
To choose between a dropdown or product variant buttons, edit your product page (not your product details.) Click “Edit Section” for the section with your product, and click “Variant Display.” Here you can select between a dropdown and buttons.
If you’re not sure how to add variants in the first place, I have a whole tutorial that walks through the process of adding product variants and taking custom orders.
Saving changes without exiting the editor
Last but not least…this update was very simple, but long overdue. One of the most frustrating things about editing a page in Squarespace was that, every time you saved your work, you had to exit the editor. Then you had to click ‘Edit’ all over again to keep working.
Well, that pesky system is finally fixed!
You can now save your progress as you work, without exiting the editor. Then, when you’re done working on a page, all you have to do is click the new ‘Exit’ button.
