---
sidebar: { hide: true }
title: Can I use my Storybook in development mode to run a Chromatic build?
section: "usage"
---

# Can I use my Storybook in development mode to run a Chromatic build?

Although you can use a development build of your Storybook with Chromatic, we recommend against it. Instead, use a production build of your Storybook to closely mimic your production code. The behavior of Storybook in development and production modes differs. For example, styles may be applied differently, code gets optimized or development packages may be removed.

Chromatic generates the production build by running the `build-storybook` command (different from `start-storybook`) during the build process.

To view a production build locally, run:

1. `npm run build-storybook`
2. `npx http-server storybook-static -o`