For over ten years, we have operated a public WordPress blog and have encountered numerous situations where complete privacy is essential.
You might still be developing your site and prefer not to reveal it to the public just yet. Alternatively, you may wish to restrict access to your content to paying members only. By making your blog private, only you and selected visitors can view your posts.
In this comprehensive guide, we will walk you through the process of making your WordPress blog fully private.
Reasons to Keep Your WordPress Blog Private
Typically, when you create a new blog post in WordPress, your intention is to share it with the entire world. However, there are times when you may want to keep your entire blog or specific posts confidential, accessible only to designated users.
There are various reasons to consider making your WordPress blog private:
- A blog that is still being developed or undergoing maintenance, not yet ready for public viewing.
- A family blog dedicated to sharing personal events, wedding photographs, baby milestones, and more.
- A private blog intended for your personal diary or journal entries.
- A collaborative space for teams to work on projects and share ideas without public exposure.
- An educational website featuring lessons and notes exclusively available to enrolled students.
In this guide, we will explore how to make your WordPress blog fully private. We will discuss four distinct methods, and you can use the quick links below to navigate directly to your preferred approach:
- Method 1: Create a Coming Soon Page Using SeedProd
- Method 2: Build a Private Members-Only Website with MemberPress
- Method 3: Activate Coming Soon/Maintenance Mode on Your WordPress Hosting
- Method 4: Make Your WordPress Blog Fully Private with My Private Site
- Method 5: Set Individual Blog Posts to Private Using WordPress Settings
Method 1: Create a Coming Soon Page Using SeedProd
The simplest way to keep your entire site private is by using the SeedProd plugin. It is the leading drag-and-drop page builder for WordPress, trusted by over 1 million websites.
This plugin allows you to effortlessly create coming soon and maintenance mode pages, ensuring your WordPress blog remains private. Additionally, it helps you grow your email list while you develop your blog.
SeedProd also offers over 350 customizable templates for creating various pages, including 404 error pages, webinar registration pages, and even complete custom WordPress themes without any coding required.
If you’re looking to set up a ‘coming soon’ page for your blog launch, check out our comprehensive guide on creating an attractive coming soon page in WordPress using SeedProd.
In addition to keeping your blog private, your coming soon page can help you measure user interest, generate excitement, and collect leads.
Once your coming soon page is active, you can maintain your blog’s privacy for as long as needed. You can also personalize your coming soon page to serve as a home screen while your blog is still private.
If you need to temporarily put your blog in maintenance mode, refer to our guide on how to enable maintenance mode for your WordPress site.
When your blog is in maintenance mode, you can make changes freely or even start a new blog from scratch. This mode also prevents search engines from indexing and ranking your site.
Your visitors will only see the maintenance mode screen during this time.
Note:To discover more about the capabilities of the plugin, read our detailed SeedProd review.
Method 2: Create a Private Members-Only Website Using MemberPress
Another effective way to maintain a private WordPress blog is by establishing a membership site that is exclusively accessible to members.
The most effective way to achieve this is by using the MemberPress plugin. It is one of the leading WordPress membership and content protection plugins, empowering creators to generate over $1 billion in revenue.
This plugin allows you to effortlessly create online courses, manage access permissions, and add lessons, all within the WordPress block editor.
Additionally, it seamlessly integrates with popular WordPress page builder plugins, enables you to implement drip content for premium posts, set up content paywalls, and restrict access to specific users.
For comprehensive instructions on establishing your members-only website, refer to our ultimate guide on creating a WordPress membership site.
Method 3: Activate Coming Soon/Maintenance Mode on Your WordPress Hosting
Many WordPress hosting providers offer a simple one-click option to enable coming soon or maintenance mode, making it a fast and effective way to keep your WordPress blog entirely private.
However, when this mode is active, visitors will only see your hosting provider’s default ‘Coming Soon’ or ‘Maintenance Mode’ page, which cannot be customized to reflect your branding like it can with SeedProd.
If you are comfortable with this limitation, feel free to proceed with this method.
The location of the settings for ‘Coming Soon’ or ‘Maintenance Mode’ varies by hosting provider. For Bluehost users, log in to the hosting dashboard and go to the ‘Websites’ tab.
Select your website and click on ‘Settings.’
You will find a variety of options and menus to configure your web hosting and website settings.
Simply switch to the ‘Settings’ tab and find the ‘Coming Soon Page’ section. Activate the coming soon mode by clicking the toggle.
For Hostinger users, start by logging into your hosting control panel.
Next, go to the ‘Websites’ page, select ‘Websites list,’ and click ‘Dashboard’ for the WordPress blog you wish to make private.
In the left sidebar, navigate to the ‘WordPress’ menu and open the ‘Overview’ section.
You will see the ‘Maintenance Mode’ setting. Activate it by clicking the toggle button.
Method 4: Make Your WordPress Blog Fully Private Using My Private Site
Another effective way to make your WordPress blog private is by utilizing the My Private Site plugin. This plugin is ideal for family blogs and businesses that intend to keep their content private.
This method can also be utilized while your website is being developed, but the SeedProd approach mentioned earlier is far more effective for creating a ‘Coming Soon’ or ‘Under Construction’ page.
The first step is to install and activate the plugin. For detailed instructions, refer to our beginner’s guide on installing a WordPress plugin.
Once activated, navigate to My Private Site » Site Privacy in the WordPress admin sidebar to adjust the plugin settings.
Next, check the ‘Enable login privacy’ option to make your site private.
Then, click the ‘Save Privacy Status’ button.
With this option activated, visitors will encounter your site’s login page when attempting to access your website.
Next, select the ‘Landing Page’ menu option. Here, you can specify where users will be redirected after they successfully log in.
Simply select an option from the ‘Landing Page After Login’ section, or input a specific URL in the ‘Specified Destination URL’ field.
Then, click the ‘Save Landing Page’ button.
After that, click on the ‘Home Page’ menu option.
Here, you can check the box in the ‘Site Home’ section to allow visitors access to your homepage.
We will leave the option unchecked. However, if you wish to display a message to visitors while keeping your WordPress site private, you can check this box.
If you make any changes, be sure to click the ‘Make Page Public’ button to apply them.
Next, navigate to the ‘Membership’ menu option. Here, you can decide whether or not to allow users to register for your blog.
To enable visitor registration and access to your blog, both options must be checked. If you prefer to keep user registration disabled, simply leave both options unchecked.
After that, click the ‘Update Options’ button to save your changes.
Once completed, your WordPress blog will be fully private.
Only users with valid login credentials will be able to access and view your blog.
Method 5: Make Individual Blog Posts Fully Private Using WordPress Settings
This method is ideal for making specific blog posts private. You can utilize the built-in privacy settings in WordPress for this purpose.
Simply open the blog post you wish to make private or create a new one. On the post editor screen, you’ll find a ‘Visibility’ option in the ‘Status & visibility’ meta box.
Next, click on the ‘Public’ link to change the visibility settings.
This opens a dropdown menu where you can select the ‘Private’ option or set your post to be password-protected. Choose the option that best suits your needs.
If you opt for password protection, you’ll need to create a password. Your visitors will need to enter this password to access the post.
After making your changes, be sure to click the ‘Update’ or ‘Publish’ button to make your private post visible.
Now, only administrators and editors can view the post while logged into the WordPress admin dashboard.
If you are the sole user of your blog, this won’t be an issue. However, if there are other users, ensure they have the appropriate user role to access the post.
For further information, check out our guide on how to add or remove capabilities for user roles in WordPress.
If you want users to register or become members before accessing your private content, refer to our guide on how to implement content locking in WordPress.
Discover More WordPress Blogging Tips and Tricks
If you found this article helpful, you might also be interested in these related articles:
- How to Automatically Curate Content in WordPress
- Beginner’s Guide to Preventing Blog Content Scraping in WordPress
- Should You Keep or Delete Old Content on Your WordPress Site? Expert Insights
- A Complete Guide to Blogging Anonymously with WordPress
- The Simple Method for Redacting Text in WordPress
- How to Quickly Identify and Remove Stolen Content from Your WordPress Site
- Step-by-Step Guide to Creating a Private Post in WordPress
We hope this article has helped you understand how to make your WordPress blog entirely private. You might also be interested in our article on the most popular blog types and our expert recommendations for the best WordPress blogs to follow.
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