How to Fix Common WordPress Issues

Fix WordPress Issues

WordPress is the most popular CMS around the globe. It is very handy to use which makes it unique and popular. It is quite normal to have common WordPress issues that may break your website. In this article, we are going to discuss a few common WordPress issues and how to fix them.

Table of content

Things to Fix WordPress Issues

  • FTP or cPanel details to access your host/server.
  • Any suitable editor such as VS Code, Sublime, Notepad++.
  • Admin Login credentials for your WordPress site.

Please make sure to take your website backup before doing anything. It is always recommended and good practice.

1. Internal Server Error

This one is one of the most common wordpress issues. The internal server error is server related error and this makes the crazy to the non-technical guys. There are many reasons for this error but we are going to discuss the two most common issues i.e. .htaccess or low memory limit.

Debug WordPress Issue through .htaccess: First, login through FTP or cPanel to your server and download the .htaccess file. The next step is to delete everything from it. Now paste the codes as it is to the .htaccess file and re-upload it to the same location.

# BEGIN WordPress

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]

# END WordPress

Once you finish the above step, then navigate your site and refresh it to verify if it starts working. If you are interested in then please check out our most helpful .htaccess rewrite rules for WordPress.

Increase WordPress Memory Limit: It’s very easy to increase the wordpress memory limit and we must need the FTP or cPanel login details to fix this issue. Now login to your server and navigate the wp-config.php file from the root directory. And paste the given code near the define( 'WP_DEBUG', true);

define('WP_MEMORY_LIMIT', '256M');

2. White Screen of Death

Don’t frighten by the name of the issue. It doesn’t mean that your website is dead, we call it because we get the white screen. The problem is we don’t get the error message that might lead us in the right direction. There are a few ways to fix this wordpress issue.

  1. Increase Memory Limit: Most of the hosts/servers assign the low memory limit to its users and that may cause the white screen of death error. You can fix this issue but increasing the memory limit through the wp-config.php file. You need to add the define('WP_MEMORY_LIMIT', '256M'); to the wp-config.php file.
  2. Set Default Theme: Sometimes, this error occurs when you try to install the new theme. In this case, you need to set the default theme.
  3. Disabling the plugins: Faulty plugin sometimes causes for this error. In this case, you have to disable the plugin one by one and identify and remove it from your website.

3. Image Upload Issues

This one also the most known WordPress issue that does not let you upload the image. TBH, it is very easy to fix the image upload issue. It is basically because of the large image ratio, special characters in the image name, or low image upload limit. You should take care of the following things to fix this issue.

  1. Do not upload a very large image. The large image also impacts on your website performance. In this case, you need to resize the image as per your website requirement.
  2. Your image name should not contain special characters like ~,`,$,%,*. You must rename the image name if it contains the specifies special characters.
  3. Many host/server provides the default 2MB of limit to upload an image. If your image size is more then 2MB then you get the same image upload issue. You can increase this size by modifying the php.ini file. Let’s say, we want to increase the max upload size to 8MB instead of 2MB then i have to change the following in the php.ini file.
; Maximum allowed size for uploaded files.
upload_max_filesize = 8M

; Must be greater than or equal to upload_max_filesize
post_max_size = 8M

4. WordPress Parse/Syntax Error

Parse or Syntax error also the most common WordPress error. This error occurs because of the incorrect codes. Sometimes this error may come with faulty themes or plugins. Or if you try to add something to your site through functions.php file. If this error is related to your changes in functions.php file then you need to correct the incorrect codes. Or you should hire WordPress expert to fix this issue.

5. Connection Timed Out Error

This error comes when you have a shared hosting for your wordpress site. The connection timed out error is the cause of some complex queries that take more resources. Shared hosting provides very limited resources that terminate the execution and generates the connection timed out error. You can fix this issue by disabling the plugins and themes, increasing the memory limit, and increasing the execution time. Increasing memory limit and execution time are related to the server. To increase these limits, you need to modify the php.ini file.

upload_max_filesize = 8M
post_max_size = 8M
max_execution_time = 9000

6. Error Establishing a Database Connection Issue

The ‘Error Establishing a Database Connection’ error is related to the database. The database is a kind of storage to store all your website content. This is also one of the most common WordPress issues. We need to do the following checks to fix this issue.

  • Make sure you have the correct database credentials like database name, database username, database password.
  • Open the wp-config.php file and match the database information.
  • Check for the database host information. Some hosting providers use to host databases to a separate server and in this case, the localhost won’t work.
  • Try to repair the database but adding the define('WP_ALLOW_REPAIR', true); to wp-config.php file.

We hope this article will help you to fix the most common wordpress issues. If you like this article then please follow us on Facebook and Twitter.