Show a maintenance page (recommended)
- Create a simple maintenance.html page in public_html.
- Add this to the top of .htaccess, replacing the IP with your own (from whatismyip.com) so you can still see the real site:
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} !^203\.0\.113\.10$
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/maintenance\.html$
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /maintenance.html [R=307,L]
The 307 (temporary) redirect tells search engines the site will be back, so your rankings aren't affected.
Block all visitors except you
Require ip 203.0.113.10
Visitors get a 403 Forbidden error.
WordPress
Maintenance or "coming soon" plugins do the same job from inside WordPress.
Remove the rules when you're ready to go live. Your email isn't affected by any of these methods.
