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How dlvr.it finds and displays suggested media

How dlvr.it selects the image and metadata for a link preview, how to check what your link is showing, and what to fix when the wrong image — or no image — appears.

When you paste a link into dlvr.it, we scan the page and suggest images and text to go along with your post.

How dlvr.it picks images from your link

dlvr.it scans the page as soon as you paste a URL and looks for the best available images. Here’s what happens behind the scenes:

  • We check for Open Graph tags (like og:image) in the page’s HTML first

  • Only the first 15 images that pass our quality check are considered

  • To qualify, an image must include a width or height attribute and be at least 200×200px

Tip
Make sure your images are tagged correctly in HTML. A well-formatted image looks like this: <img src="link-to-your-image" width="600"/>

How dlvr.it chooses which image comes first

Not all images are treated equally. dlvr.it works through this priority order:

  1. Open Graph & Twitter Card tags — og:image, og:image:secure_url, and twitter:image are checked first. These tags exist specifically to control how your content appears when shared.

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  2. Images inside article content — If no OG tags exist, we look inside <article> tags or elements marked as the main body of the page.

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  3. Everything else — If neither of the above is available, we scan the rest of the page for usable images.

We recommend following the Open Graph Protocol when setting up your site — it gives you direct control over how your content appears on dlvr.it and on the social networks you post to. For a plain-language walkthrough, see What is Open Graph and why does it matter for social sharing?

How to check what your link actually shows

Not sure what’s being pulled from your page? Run your URL through the Facebook Sharing Debugger. It’s free, takes seconds, and shows you:

  • Which metadata is available on your page

  • Which image is being selected

  • How to force a refresh if you’ve recently made changes

Note
These tips apply to pages you own and control. If you’re sharing a link to someone else’s site, the images shown are determined by how that site is set up — there’s no way to change them from your end.

Common issues and how to fix them

No preview image is appearing. Your site may be blocking dlvr.it’s scanner via firewall settings or robots.txt. To fix this, add an explicit exception to allow dlvr.it’s bot through — see How dlvr.it identifies itself and how to control feed access. If your site is behind Cloudflare, see Cloudflare: allow dlvr.it to access your RSS feeds.

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SSL certificate error. If you see a FetchError: unable to verify the first certificate message, your site’s SSL certificate chain is incomplete. Ask your website admin to update the SSL certificate to resolve this.

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Preview is showing an outdated image. Your link may be cached. Use the Facebook Sharing Debugger to force a refresh and pull the latest version.

Quick wins for better previews

A few changes to your site prevent most preview problems:

  • Add og:title, og:description, and og:image tags to every page

  • Place your og:image tag near the top of your <head> section

  • Use images that are at least 200×200px with width or height declared in the HTML

  • Make sure the dlvr.it bot isn’t blocked by your firewall or robots.txt

  • Test your links regularly using the Facebook Sharing Debugger

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Still have questions?

Still have questions about link previews and suggested media? Reach out to our support team — we’re happy to help.

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