---
title: Concepts
description: Foundational concepts behind document signing, recipient roles, field types, and certificates.
---

## Core Concepts

<Cards>
  <Card
    title="Document Lifecycle"
    description="How documents move from draft to pending to completed or rejected."
    href="/docs/concepts/document-lifecycle"
  />
  <Card
    title="Recipient Roles"
    description="Signers, approvers, viewers, assistants, and CC recipients."
    href="/docs/concepts/recipient-roles"
  />
  <Card
    title="Field Types"
    description="Signatures, text, dates, checkboxes, dropdowns, and more."
    href="/docs/concepts/field-types"
  />
  <Card
    title="Signing Workflow"
    description="The complete process from preparing a document to collecting signatures and sealing the final PDF."
    href="/docs/concepts/signing-workflow"
  />
  <Card
    title="Signing Certificates"
    description="How documents are digitally signed and verified."
    href="/docs/concepts/signing-certificates"
  />
</Cards>

---

## How These Concepts Apply

These concepts work consistently across all ways you interact with Documenso:

- **Web application**: When you create documents in the UI, you'll select recipient roles, add fields, and track documents through their lifecycle states.

- **API integration**: The same concepts map directly to API endpoints. Documents have status fields, recipients have role properties, and fields have type configurations.

- **Self-hosting**: The signing certificate concept becomes particularly relevant when you deploy your own instance and configure your own certificates for document signing.

Understanding these fundamentals will make the rest of the documentation easier to follow.

---

## Related Sections

<Cards>
  <Card
    title="User Guide"
    description="Apply these concepts when sending documents."
    href="/docs/users"
  />
  <Card
    title="Developer Guide"
    description="Work with these concepts through the API."
    href="/docs/developers"
  />
  <Card
    title="Compliance"
    description="How these concepts relate to legal standards."
    href="/docs/compliance"
  />
</Cards>
