Before Riterly generates a draft, it stops and shows you the structure it plans to build. That pause is deliberate. Structural problems are cheap to fix at the outline stage — a few edits, a heading reworded, a section moved. The same problems after a full draft exists cost you a re-draft credit and another generation cycle to fix.
The outline review is where you catch those problems.
What the Outline Review Is
The outline review is a mandatory checkpoint in Riterly's draft generation pipeline. It sits between Pass 1 (the research pass) and Pass 2 (draft generation).
Nothing moves to Pass 2 until you explicitly approve the outline. This is the approval gate — a deliberate hold point designed to give you a clear look at the post's planned structure before the expensive generation step runs.
The approval gate is not a formality. It's the moment in the process where you confirm that the AI has correctly understood what you want to cover, in what order, and at what scope. If it hasn't, the outline review is where you correct that.
What the Outline Contains
The outline Riterly generates at the end of Pass 1 has four components:
- Post title — the title as interpreted from your working title and any notes you provided. This may differ slightly from your working title if the research pass produced a clearer framing.
- Section headings in flow order — the main sections of the post, arranged in the sequence the draft will follow.
- Key points under each heading — a summary of what Riterly plans to cover within each section. These are the building blocks the draft will expand on.
- Closing/conclusion structure — how the post ends: the takeaway, call to action, or final framing the draft will land on.
The outline is the blueprint. It is not the draft. Reading it takes a minute or two. Catching a structural problem here — a section in the wrong order, a point you don't want covered, an angle that missed your intent — saves you from reading 1,200 words that did it the wrong way.
Three Actions at the Outline Review Screen
At the outline review screen, three actions are available: Edit, Regenerate, and Approve.
Edit
Edit opens the outline for direct modification. You can adjust headings, reorder sections, add or remove key points, and clarify scope. Your changes are saved and passed directly into Pass 2 — the draft is generated from the edited outline, not from Riterly's original version.
Edit is the right action when the outline is mostly correct but needs adjustment. A heading that doesn't quite match your angle, a section that should come earlier, a point you want added — these are all edit-level changes.
Regenerate
Regenerate discards the current outline and produces a new one from the same inputs: the research digest, your notes, and your writing profile. It does not re-run the research pass.
Each regeneration costs approximately $0.02. Regenerations are not metered against any usage limit — they don't count against your plan's generation credits.
Regenerate is the right action when the AI has clearly misread your intent — wrong angle, wrong scope, missed the point entirely. If the outline is structurally sound but just needs some adjustment, editing is faster and less disruptive than starting over.
Approve
Approve locks the outline and starts Pass 2. Once you approve, Riterly begins generating the full draft based on what the outline contains at the moment of approval.
How Your Edits Shape the Draft
When you edit the outline before approving, your version is what the draft is built from. The AI's original outline is not carried forward — your structural decisions are authoritative.
This has direct consequences:
- If you remove a section, it will not appear in the draft. Riterly will not infer that you still wanted it or add it back as a related topic.
- If you add a point under a heading, the draft will cover it. Riterly treats added points as part of the brief.
- If you reorder sections, the draft will follow the order you set.
The approval gate is the right time to say "actually, I want to cover X before Y" — before 1,200 words exist that do it the other way. Changes made at the outline stage cost nothing beyond the time it takes to make them.
What Happens After Approval — and How to Change Course
When you click Approve, the outline is locked. Pass 2 begins, and Riterly generates the full draft from the approved structure.
After approval, you cannot edit the outline directly. If you read the draft and realize the structure needs to change — a section is in the wrong place, a key point is missing, the angle needs to shift — you can revert the post back to outline review from the draft view. This does not restore the original outline for free editing. It requires re-running Pass 2, which costs a re-draft credit.
That cost is why the approval gate exists. The outline review gives you a low-cost window to get the structure right. Once that window closes and the draft exists, changing course carries a real price.
The most common pattern in practice: minor edits before approval, then approve. The combination of your notes, the research digest, and your writing profile usually produces a structurally sound outline. Full regenerations are less common, and reserved for cases where the AI has genuinely missed the intent of the piece.
For what happens next — how Riterly uses the approved outline to generate the full draft in Pass 2 — see the Draft Generation help page.