Answer · Website Redesign

How Do You Test Before Launch?

2 min read303 words

WDCT Senior Strategist Web Design Company Tampa · Editorial

Updated May 16, 2026

14 days kickoff → live $3K–$15K+ scope-tiered WCAG 2.1 AA baseline

The short answer

We run a 22-item pre-launch checklist covering Lighthouse scores, WCAG accessibility, cross-browser smoke tests, mobile QA, form submissions, analytics firing, 301 spot-checks, schema validation, SSL, backups, security. Every item must be green before launch.

№ 01The longer answer

The 22-item checklist is non-negotiable. Every item is signed off before we cut over to production. Skipping items is how disasters happen — missed robots.txt, missing analytics, broken 301s, schema regressions. The checklist catches them.

The big ones: Lighthouse 90+ Performance on top 20 pages, Lighthouse 100 Accessibility (WCAG 2.1 AA), cross-browser test (Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge), mobile test (iPhone Safari, Pixel Chrome), form submission test (every form, every routing rule), GA4 + GTM verification, schema validation in Google Rich Results Test, 301 spot-check via curl on 20 random URLs.

The often-missed ones: robots.txt verification (the #1 launch-day mistake is leaving staging’s Disallow: / live), canonical tag verification (every page should self-canonicalize), Open Graph and Twitter Card tags, 404 page on-brand, favicon set, daily backup running, SSL certificate valid 60+ days out.

Timing: full checklist runs Day 13 on staging. Re-verification of critical items (robots.txt, SSL, GA4, sitemap) runs Day 14 morning post-cutover. Active monitoring continues for 7 days post-launch with daily GSC + GA4 spot-checks.

№ 02Can I see the checklist?

Yes — we share it as a Google Sheet at Day 10. You can verify items independently or wait for our sign-off. Transparency is the point.

№ 03What if an item fails QA?

Launch slips by 1-2 days while we fix. Hitting Day 14 with a failed item isn’t an option; the disciplines that make 14 days work are the disciplines that make the site work post-launch.

№ 04Do you do user testing pre-launch?

Card-sort during IA phase, yes. Full user-tested QA on the design is post-launch (week 2-4 with real visitors and heatmap data). Pre-launch user testing extends timeline too much for diminishing returns.

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