Choose web or offline help
Some ArcGIS products provide web and offline help. When both options are available, you can choose which one to use. Choosing between web and offline help determines where help topics open from when you press F1 or click help links in the user interface.
Web help is accessed through a web browser and displays documentation hosted on Esri’s documentation websites. Offline help also is accessed through a web browser but opens documentation that you download and store locally using ArcGIS Documentation Center. Both options provide the same structure and content for a given product and release, but they differ in where the content is accessed from and whether an internet connection is required.
This topic explains when to use web help, when offline help is more appropriate, and how this choice affects how you access documentation while working in Esri products.
When to use web help
Web help opens documentation from the web and always reflects the most current version available on Esri’s documentation sites.
Use web help when:
You have reliable internet access.
You want to see the most up‑to‑date documentation.
You do not need to store documentation locally.
When web help is selected, help topics open in your default web browser and links in the product interface point to web‑hosted documentation.
When to use offline help
Offline help opens documentation that is stored locally on your machine or a shared network drive and does not require an internet connection.
Use offline help when:
You work in the field or in locations with limited or no internet access.
You work in secure or restricted environments.
You need predictable access to documentation without relying on the web.
Offline help is provided by ArcGIS Documentation Center for the following products: ArcGIS Pro, AllSource, Drone2Map, and Reality Studio.
After installing ArcGIS Documentation Center, you download documentation sets for the products, versions, and languages you need. Help links in the product can be configured to then open the offline documentation in your browser. You can open the documentation directly from the ArcGIS Documentation Center app as well. In either case, a local server is used to serve the documentation content to your browser.
The offline documentation is updated periodically like the web help, however, you need to download the updated documentation sets in ArcGIS Documentation Center to have access to the latest content.