4 Reasons to Go PRO on CodePen

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Chris Coyier on

I could probably list about 100 reasons, since as a founder, user, and (ahem) PRO member of CodePen myself, I’m motivated to do so. But let me just list a few here. Some of these are my favorites, some are what PRO members have told us are their favorite, and some are lesser-known but very awesome.

1) No-hassle Debug View

Debug View is a way to look at your the Pen you’ve built with zero CodePen UI around it and no <iframe> containing it. Raw output! That’s a dangerous thing, in the world of user-generated code. It could be highly abused if we let it go unchecked. The way it works is fairly simple.

You can use Debug View if :

  1. You’re logged in
  2. The Pen is PRO-owned

Logging in isn’t too big of a deal, but sometimes that’s a pain if you just wanna shoot over a Debug View URL to your phone or to CrossBrowserTesting or something. If you’re PRO, you don’t worry about it at all, Debug View is totally unlocked for your Pens.

2) Collab with anybody anytime

Collab Mode on CodePen is the one that’s like Google Docs: people can work together in real time on the same Pen. You type, they see you type, they type, you see what they type.

Here’s what is special about that:

  • There is nothing to install or set up, just shoot anybody a link.
  • Only you need to be PRO. Nobody else does. They don’t even have to be logged in.

Basically, you can be coding together with someone (or just one or the other of you watching, if you please) in about 2 seconds. Here’s a short silent video if you wanna see:

People use it for all sorts of things. In classrooms and educational contexts, for hiring interviews, and just for working out problems with people across the globe.

Drag and drop uploading

Need to quickly host an asset (like an image) somewhere? As in, quickly get a URL for it that you can use and count on forever? It’s as easy as can be on CodePen.

If you’re working on a Project, you can drag and drop files right into the sidebar as well:

Save Anything Privately

Privacy is unlimited on CodePen. If you’re PRO, you can make unlimited Private Pens and Private Collections. You’re only limited in Private Projects by the total number of Projects on your plan. This is the number one PRO feature on CodePen for a variety of reasons. People use them to keep client work safe. People use them to experiment without anyone seeing messy tidbits. People use them to keep in-progress ideas.


I didn’t even mention my actual favorite CodePen PRO feature. I’ll have to share that one some other time ;)

Go PRO on CodePen