Seeing an error message instead of your website can be incredibly distressing for any business owner. We once had a reader reach out in a panic when their site crashed during a major sale, and we understand how overwhelming that can be.
The good news is that many issues can be resolved on your own with a few straightforward checks. After assisting thousands of users and troubleshooting our own sites, we’ve compiled a list of the most frequent causes.
In this guide, we will guide you through the precise troubleshooting steps we use to quickly restore a WordPress site. Let’s begin with the simplest solution first.
What Causes Your WordPress Website to Keep Going Down?
When your WordPress website is down, visitors will encounter an error message that prevents them from accessing the page.
If your website is down due to one of the common WordPress errors, you can easily fix it to resolve the problem.
However, if the issue persists or your website is not displaying an error message, further investigation will be necessary.
Website downtime can occur for various reasons, including unreliable hosting, an expired domain, security issues, errors in custom code, and more.
Another potential cause of downtime is a surge in website traffic that surpasses the resource limits of your WordPress hosting.
If your WordPress site frequently experiences downtime, it can negatively impact your business. You may see a decrease in conversion rates and potentially lose customers.
Fortunately, we have put together a comprehensive list of steps to take if your WordPress site keeps going offline. These measures will assist you in diagnosing the issue and resolving it effectively:
- Determine Whether the Issue Is on Your End or if the Website Is Down for Everyone
- Ensure Your WordPress Hosting Plan Is Still Active
- Verify That Your Domain Registration Is Current
- Examine Your Plugins and Themes for Issues
- Review Your WordPress Configuration Settings
- Check That Your Permalinks Are Functioning Properly
- Consider Reuploading the Core WordPress Files
- Implement a Firewall to Protect Your Website
- Switch to a More Reliable WordPress Hosting Provider
- Common Questions and Answers (FAQs)
- Further Reading and Resources
1. Determine Whether the Issue Is on Your End or if the Website Is Down for Everyone
Your WordPress site might not be down for all users. Occasionally, access issues could be due to a network problem or an internet connectivity issue on your end.
First, confirm whether your website is down for everyone or just you. You can use IsItWP’s free uptime checker to verify this.
Begin by visiting the Website Uptime Status Checker and input your site URL.
Click the ‘Analyze Website’ button, and the tool will indicate whether your site is down for everyone or just you.
If the site is only down for you, check your internet connection. You might want to clear your browser cache or restart your network router.
If the website is down for everyone, keep reading to discover how to resolve the issue.
2. Verify That Your WordPress Hosting Plan Is Active
A frequent cause of website downtime is an issue with your WordPress hosting provider. Your plan may have lapsed, or the provider could be experiencing server difficulties.
First, confirm that your hosting plan is still active. You can typically find this information in your hosting account dashboard.
Before reaching out to support, it’s wise to check your host’s status page. Simply search Google for “[Your Hosting Company] status page.” Most providers use these pages to communicate server maintenance or report major outages, which can provide you with immediate answers and alleviate concerns!
If your hosting plan is still active but your WordPress site keeps going offline, it’s important to reach out to your hosting provider. They may be experiencing server issues, and they can give you more details about the situation.
For instance, your hosting provider could be undergoing server maintenance, dealing with DDoS attacks, or may have temporarily taken some servers offline. Any of these factors can lead to downtime.
Additionally, your website might be down due to hardware failures on the host’s server.
In such cases, your website should be back online once the hosting provider resolves the problems.
If you frequently encounter issues with your current hosting provider, consider switching to a more dependable managed WordPress hosting service.
We recommend choosing either SiteGround, Hostinger, or WP Engine.
Expert Tip:We host CanadaCreate with SiteGround. Their exceptional performance and reliability are key reasons our site remains accessible, even with millions of visitors.
3. Check That Your Domain Has Not Expired
Sometimes, your website may go offline because the domain name you registered when launching your site has expired. If this is the case, it will need to be renewed.
To check the status of your domain, log in to the account where you registered it, such as Domain.com, Bluehost, or SiteGround. Your account dashboard will indicate if your domain has expired and provide instructions for renewal.
If you’re uncertain about where you registered your domain, you can utilize a WHOIS lookup tool. This tool reveals public registration information, including the expiration date and the registrar.
The WHOIS tool will retrieve details about your domain name. If your domain has expired, it may appear as available for registration.
If your domain is available, you can renew it through any domain registrar, like Network Solutions. For detailed guidance, refer to our comprehensive guide on renewing a domain name.
Some hosting providers, such as Hostinger, offer a complimentary domain name when you purchase a hosting plan. Hostinger is a leading WordPress hosting service that includes a free domain with any of its web hosting options.
Additionally, you can take advantage of our Bluehost coupon code, which offers CanadaCreate users a free domain name, an SSL certificate, and significant discounts on web hosting plans.
4. Examine Your Plugins and Themes
WordPress plugins and themes can occasionally lead to website downtime. They may be outdated or contain vulnerabilities that hackers could exploit to disrupt your site.
A WordPress theme may conflict with a specific version of WordPress or a plugin installed on your site.
Conflicts occur when two plugins, or a plugin and a theme, attempt to perform the same function in different ways. It’s similar to two apps on your phone trying to access the camera simultaneously, which can lead to freezing or crashing. Deactivating plugins helps identify which ones are incompatible.
To determine if a plugin or theme is responsible for the downtime, you should deactivate all plugins and switch to a default theme.
Deactivate All WordPress Plugins
Disabling all WordPress plugins can quickly reveal whether one of them is causing your site’s downtime.
If you can access the WordPress admin area, navigate to thePlugins » Installed Pluginssection from the admin sidebar.
Here, you can select all plugins by checking the bulk select checkbox at the top.
Next, open the ‘Bulk actions’ dropdown menu and choose the ‘Deactivate’ option.
Then, click the ‘Apply’ button to deactivate all plugins.
If you don’t have access to the WordPress admin area, you can deactivate plugins using a File Transfer Protocol (FTP) client.
Begin by accessing your website through an FTP client or the File Manager in your hosting account’s cPanel. Once connected, navigate to the /wp-content/ directory.
Within this directory, locate the folder labeled ‘plugins.’ This is where all your WordPress plugin files are kept.
Rename the plugins folder to ‘plugins_deactivate.’ This action will deactivate all the WordPress plugins that are currently installed on your site.
For comprehensive guidance, please refer to our tutorial on how to deactivate WordPress plugins when you cannot access the WP-Admin area.
Switch to a Default WordPress Theme
The issue with your WordPress site may also stem from your theme, particularly if it is poorly coded or incompatible with a plugin.
To investigate this, you can force WordPress to revert to a default theme, such as Twenty Twenty-Three.
First, connect to your site using an FTP client or the File Manager in your hosting control panel. After connecting, go to the /wp-content/themes/ directory.
In this directory, you will find folders for each installed theme. Locate the folder for your currently active theme and rename it by adding ‘-deactivated’ to the end of the name (for instance, change ‘mytheme’ to ‘mytheme-deactivated’).
Deactivating your current theme can help resolve the issue. If you have a default theme like ‘Twenty Twenty-Three’ in your themes folder, WordPress will automatically revert to it, bringing your site back online. You can then log in to your admin area for further investigation.
If changing the theme or disabling plugins didn’t fix the problem, keep reading for more solutions.
5. Review Your WordPress Settings
Your website may go offline due to incorrect configuration settings in WordPress. A common issue is having the wrong WordPress address.
First, verify that your WordPress address and site address are identical.
The WordPress address refers to the location of your WordPress files and folders, while the site address is the URL that visitors use to access your website.
If you can access the WordPress admin dashboard, navigate to the Settings » General section from the admin sidebar.
Ensure that the ‘WordPress Address’ and ‘Site Address’ fields contain the same URL.
If you cannot access the WordPress admin, you can check your site URLs by editing the wp-config.php file.
For comprehensive guidance, refer to our tutorial on updating your WordPress site URLs.
6. Ensure Your Permalinks Are Functioning Properly
Permalinks are the permanent links assigned to your posts and pages on the website.
Permalinks may become broken when you install or update a specific theme or plugin. Additionally, transferring your website to a new server or domain can disrupt your permalinks, leading to site downtime.
To fix this, you can regenerate your permalinks by navigating to Settings » Permalinks in the WordPress dashboard. Ensure that the correct permalink structure is selected here.
Then, click the ‘Save Changes’ button at the bottom to restore the broken permalinks.
If this solution does not resolve the issue, we suggest checking our tutorial on regenerating permalinks in WordPress for alternative methods.
If your website remains inaccessible after fixing the permalinks, continue to the next steps.
7. Consider Reuploading the WordPress Core Files
Updating the core WordPress software can lead to downtime if the core files become corrupted or modified. When this occurs, essential system files for your website may not be accessible.
To resolve this issue, try re-uploading the /wp-admin/ and /wp-includes/ folders from a fresh WordPress installation.
This approach will not delete any data or content from your site, but it may repair a corrupted core file.
Important:If you still have access to your WordPress admin dashboard, there’s a simpler and safer method. Just go toDashboard » Updates. You should see a ‘Re-install version [x.x.x]’ button. Clicking this will automatically replace the core files without needing FTP.
First, visit the WordPress.org website and click on the ‘Download & Extend’ menu, then select ‘Get WordPress.’
Next, click the blue ‘Download WordPress’ button to download the .zip file to your computer.
Then, extract the zip file and locate the ‘wordpress’ folder within it.
After that, connect to your website using an FTP client. Once connected, navigate to the root folder of your website, typically named ‘public_html’, which contains the wp-admin, wp-includes, and wp-content folders, along with other files.
First, connect to your website using an FTP client. Once connected, go to the root directory of your website, typically named ‘public_html’, which contains the wp-admin, wp-includes, and wp-content folders.
Next, open the ‘wordpress’ folder on your computer. Select the wp-admin and wp-includes folders, and upload them to the root directory of your website.
Important: Do NOT upload the wp-content folder from the fresh download, as this will overwrite your existing themes, plugins, and uploads.
Your FTP client will prompt you to overwrite existing files. Choose ‘Overwrite’ and check the box for ‘Always use this action’ to ensure all corrupted files are replaced.
Finally, click the ‘OK’ button. Your outdated WordPress files will now be replaced with fresh versions.
If replacing the corrupted files does not resolve the issue, proceed to the next step.
8. Install a Firewall on Your Website
Your WordPress site may also be down due to malware infections or DDoS attacks.
During a DDoS attack, hackers send a massive volume of data requests to your WordPress hosting server, causing it to slow down and potentially crash.
Malware is a type of software that infiltrates your WordPress files, consuming server resources by attacking other websites or generating spam.
Fortunately, you can effectively prevent DDoS attacks and malware by implementing a web application firewall.
The firewall serves as a protective barrier between your website and incoming traffic, identifying and blocking suspicious requests before they reach your server.
We recommend using a DNS-level firewall like Cloudflare. Its powerful free plan offers strong DDoS protection and a web application firewall (WAF) that prevents harmful traffic from reaching your site. This is one of the most effective ways to safeguard your website from such attacks.
Expert Tip:At CanadaCreate, we utilize Cloudflare’s enterprise plan, which effectively blocks attacks automatically and plays a crucial role in our security strategy.
For additional on-site security, we suggest installing the free Sucuri plugin. It provides security hardening, malware scanning, and file integrity monitoring directly from your WordPress dashboard. Combining Cloudflare and Sucuri offers excellent layers of protection.
You may find our article comparing Sucuri and Cloudflare helpful for a detailed analysis.
To enhance the security of your website, it’s crucial to implement best practices for WordPress security. For comprehensive guidance, check out our detailed WordPress security guide, which provides step-by-step instructions on how to protect your site.
9. Switch to a Reliable WordPress Hosting Provider
If you’ve exhausted all troubleshooting steps and your website continues to experience downtime, it may be time to transition to a dependable WordPress hosting service.
For small businesses or personal blogs, we recommend considering Bluehost or Hostinger for your hosting needs.
If you operate an online store, SiteGround is an excellent hosting choice as it offers a managed EDD hosting plan, allowing you to quickly set up an eCommerce store. It’s also a strong option for WooCommerce users.
If your business is growing quickly, you should look into a managed WordPress hosting provider like WP Engine for optimal performance.
After selecting a hosting provider, the next step is to transfer your website to the new host.
Most hosting companies provide a complimentary migration service, enabling you to transfer your website without any downtime.
You can also manually migrate your website. For detailed guidance, refer to our tutorial on how to transfer WordPress to a new host or server.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Here are answers to some of the most frequently asked questions about WordPress website downtime.
1. Why does my website keep going down?
There are several possible reasons for frequent downtime. Common causes include an unreliable hosting provider, an expired domain name, conflicts with plugins or themes, or even a security breach.
2. Can a WordPress plugin crash my website?
Yes, a poorly coded plugin can definitely crash your site, especially if it conflicts with another plugin or your theme. One of the key troubleshooting steps is to deactivate all plugins to determine if that resolves the issue.
3. How much downtime is considered normal for a website?
Ideally, your website should maintain an uptime of 99.9% or higher. Frequent downtime is a clear indication of an underlying issue that needs attention, often related to your hosting service.
4. What is the first step I should take when my site is down?
Before diving into complex troubleshooting, first verify that the site is down for everyone and not just you. A free tool like IsItWP’s Uptime Checker can quickly help you determine if the issue is on your end or with the website’s server.
Helpful Resources
We hope this guide has equipped you with the knowledge to address issues when your WordPress site experiences downtime. Now that your site is operational again, you might find these additional guides beneficial for further enhancements:
- Top WordPress CDN Services Reviewed
- The Comprehensive Guide to Enhance WordPress Speed and Performance
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