Preview ref not found – content in draft not loading in multiple projects

Developing with Prismic
1

Hi there,

I’m experiencing a serious issue with the Prismic Preview system across multiple Next.js projects.

Everything was working fine before, but now even with the correct preview setup (@prismicio/next, setPreviewData, redirectToPreviewURL, etc.), the draft content does not load in preview mode — not with SSG, not with SSR, not even with a direct API request.

I performed a direct test using the preview ref returned in the token from the Prismic preview link.

Preview Ref:
Z_l_xhAAAB8AeZOP:Z_l4DBAAACp2eYgh

API Request:
https://website-b2c.cdn.prismic.io/api/v2/documents/search?ref=Z_l_xhAAAB8AeZOP:Z_l4DBAAACp2eYgh&q=[[at(my.landing_page.uid,"knn-usa-2")]]

Response:

{
  "type": "api_notfound_error",
  "message": "Ref not found. Ensure you have the correct ref and try again."
}

This page is not published — it only exists as a draft. The preview was initiated correctly, cookies were set, and the redirect worked. However, the document never loads.

This same issue is happening in multiple separate repositories, so it looks like something is broken with how preview refs are being generated or resolved.

Could you please help verify whether your preview infrastructure is working correctly?

Thank you!

3

Hi @lucas.fermino,

We haven't had any reports from other users that previews aren't working as they should, and nothing on our end looks out of the ordinary - would it be possible to get a little more information on your set-up to help you troubleshoot this? A Jam recording would be helpful, as it'll capture the browser console and let us know if anything looks out of place. Could you also share how your previews are set up in your code?

For the testing you're doing, a full cookie ref should look something like this:
https://prismic-academy.prismic.io/previews/ZafJyRIAACQAmCLi:Z_zscBEAACAAW_X4?websitePreviewId=ZS6vrxEAACEARkFl%22

So for example, you'd want it to be:
https://prismic-academy.prismic.io/api/v2/documents/search?ref=https://prismic-academy.prismic.io/previews/ZafJyRIAACQAmCLi:Z_zscBEAACAAW_X4?websitePreviewId=ZS6vrxEAACEARkFl&src=apibrowser#format=json

Instead of:
https://prismic-academy.prismic.io/api/v2/documents/search?ref=Z_zrzBEAAJokW_Tu~ZS6vrxEAACEARkFl&src=apibrowser#format=json

Let me know if that helps, and I'd also recommend checking out our Troubleshooting: Content Previews guide for additional debugging :slight_smile: