Frequently asked questions

Hugo’s forum is an active community of users and developers who answer questions, share knowledge, and provide examples. A quick search of over 20,000 topics will often answer your question. Please be sure to read about requesting help before asking your first question.

These are just a few of the questions most frequently asked by new users.

An error message indicates that a feature is not available. Why?

Hugo is available in two editions: standard and extended. With the extended edition you can (a) encode to the WebP format when processing images, and (b) transpile Sass to CSS using the embedded LibSass transpiler. The extended edition is not required to use the Dart Sass transpiler.

When you attempt to perform either of the operations above with the standard edition, Hugo throws this error:

Error: this feature is not available in your current Hugo version

To resolve, uninstall the standard edition, then install the extended edition. See the installation section for details.

Why do I see “Page Not Found” when visiting the home page?

In the content/_index.md file:

• Is draft set to true?
• Is the date in the future?
• Is the publishDate in the future?
• Is the expiryDate in the past?

If the answer to any of these questions is yes, either change the field values, or use one of these command line flags: --buildDrafts, --buildFuture, or --buildExpired.

Why is a given page not published?

In the content/section/page.md file, or in the content/section/page/index.md file:

• Is draft set to true?
• Is the date in the future?
• Is the publishDate in the future?
• Is the expiryDate in the past?

If the answer to any of these questions is yes, either change the field values, or use one of these command line flags: --buildDrafts, --buildFuture, or --buildExpired.

Why can’t I see any of a page’s descendants?

You may have an index.md file instead of an _index.md file. See details.

What is the difference between an index.md file and an _index.md file?

A directory with an index.md file is a leaf bundle. A directory with an _index.md file is a branch bundle. See details.

Why is my partial template not rendered as expected?

You may have neglected to pass the required context when calling the partial. For example:

{{/* incorrect */}}
{{ partial "_internal/pagination.html" }}

{{/* correct */}}
{{ partial "_internal/pagination.html" . }}

In a template, what’s the difference between := and = when assigning values to variables?

Use := to initialize a variable, and use = to assign a value to a variable that has been previously initialized. See details.

When I paginate a list page, why is the page collection not filtered as specified?

You are probably invoking the Paginate or Paginator method more than once on the same page. See details.

Why are there two ways to call a shortcode?

Use the {{% shortcode %}} notation if the shortcode template, or the content between the opening and closing shortcode tags, contains Markdown. Otherwise use the
{{< shortcode >}} notation. See details.

Can I use environment variables to control configuration?

Yes. See details.

Why am I seeing inconsistent output from one build to the next?

The most common causes are page collisions (publishing two pages to the same path) and the effects of concurrency. Use the --printPathWarnings command line flag to check for page collisions, and create a topic on the forum if you suspect concurrency problems.

Why isn’t Hugo’s development server detecting file changes?

In its default configuration, Hugo’s file watcher may not be able detect file changes when:

• Running Hugo within Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL/WSL2) with project files on a Windows partition
• Running Hugo locally with project files on a removable drive
• Running Hugo locally with project files on a storage server accessed via the NFS, SMB, or CIFS protocols

In these cases, instead of monitoring native file system events, use the --poll command line flag. For example, to poll the project files every 700 milliseconds, use --poll 700ms.

Why is my page Scratch or Store missing a value?

The Scratch and Store methods on a Page object allow you to create a scratch pad on the given page to store and manipulate data. Values are often set within a shortcode, a partial template called by a shortcode, or by a Markdown render hook. In all three cases, the scratch pad values are not determinate until Hugo renders the page content.

If you need to access a scratch pad value from a parent template, and the parent template has not yet rendered the page content, you can trigger content rendering by assigning the returned value to a noop variable:

{{ $noop := .Content }}
{{ .Store.Get "mykey" }}

You can trigger content rendering with other methods as well. See next FAQ.

Which page methods trigger content rendering?

The following methods on a Page object trigger content rendering: Content, FuzzyWordCount, Len, Plain, PlainWords, ReadingTime, Summary, Truncated, and WordCount.