SpecDoc

Developer Portals

Every API project in SpecDoc gets a hosted developer portal — a public-facing documentation site your customers can browse, try live requests, and export collections from.

What's in a portal

Interactive API explorer

Customers can make real API calls directly from the portal using their own credentials or an API key you provide.

Versioned docs

Every spec version published to the Registry is available in the portal. Users can switch between versions.

Postman & OpenAPI export

One-click export to Postman collection or download the raw OpenAPI file in YAML or JSON.

Code samples

Auto-generated code snippets in cURL, JavaScript, Python, and Go for every operation.

Full-text search across all endpoints, parameters, and descriptions.

Custom branding

Set your logo, primary color, and custom CSS to match your company's design system.

Default portal URL

When you publish your first spec, SpecDoc automatically creates a portal at:

https://app.speclayer.net/portal/{projectSlug}

This URL is live immediately and updates within seconds of every successful pipeline run. The portal_url is also printed in your pipeline output after each publish.

Custom domains

On the Pro plan and above, you can serve your portal at your own domain (e.g. developers.acme.com).

Setup steps:

1
Add your domain in the portal settings
Go to your project → Portal → Custom Domain. Enter the domain you want to use.
2
Add a CNAME record
In your DNS provider, create a CNAME record pointing your domain to portals.speclayer.net.
3
Wait for DNS propagation
DNS changes can take up to 48 hours to propagate. SpecLayer will automatically provision a TLS certificate once the CNAME resolves.

Example DNS record

Type:   CNAME
Name:   developers          (or @ for root domain)
Value:  portals.speclayer.net
TTL:    3600

Portal branding

Customize your portal appearance from the Portal settings page or via a config file committed to your repo:

.speclayer/portal.yaml

branding:
  logo: ./assets/logo.svg          # path relative to repo root
  favicon: ./assets/favicon.ico
  primaryColor: '#6366f1'
  companyName: 'Acme Corp'

portal:
  title: 'Acme Payments API'
  description: 'Complete reference for the Acme Payments API v2'
  hideSpecLayerBranding: true      # Pro plan and above

Access control

Portals are public by default — no login required for your customers. To restrict access, you can enable portal authentication:

Public

Anyone with the URL can view the portal. No login required. (Default)

Password protected

Visitors enter a shared password to view the portal. Useful for pre-release APIs.

Allowlist

Only specific email addresses or domains can access the portal. Visitors log in with their email.

The interactive API explorer always runs requests from your customer's browser directly to your API server. SpecLayer never proxies or logs your API traffic.

Governance Rules

CI/CD Integration