WordPress knowledge base
Everything we know about keeping a WordPress site fast, secure and online, written for owners rather than developers. Free to read, no account needed.
Browse by topic
Security
How sites actually get broken into, how to tell if yours already has been, and what closes the door. 10 articles.
- How WordPress sites actually get hacked
- Signs your WordPress site is already compromised
- Why "we are too small to be a target" is wrong
- Admin passwords and two-factor, the boring fix that works
- What a web application firewall does
- Malware scanning, what it catches and what it misses
- Why outdated plugins are the number one way in
- What to do in the first hour after a hack
- Is WordPress less secure than other platforms
- Blacklisted by Google, what it means and how to recover
Performance
Why sites get slower over time, and the handful of things that genuinely fix it. 10 articles.
- Why your WordPress site keeps slowing down
- Core Web Vitals, explained for people who do not code
- How many plugins is too many
- Why your images are the reason your site is slow
- Caching, explained without the jargon
- Is your host the reason your site is slow
- What a slow site actually costs you
- Why your site is fast for you and slow for everyone else
- Database bloat, the invisible speed problem
- Should you use a CDN
Backups
What a real backup plan looks like, and why the one your host keeps is not one. 8 articles.
- Your host's backup is not a backup plan
- How often should a WordPress site be backed up
- The backup nobody tested is not a backup
- Off-site backups, and why location matters
- How long should you keep backups
- Restoring a WordPress site, what actually happens
- What you lose when a backup is out of date
- Backups vs staging, they solve different problems
Maintenance
Updates, staging and the routine work that stops small problems becoming outages. 8 articles.
- Why WordPress updates break sites
- Should you turn on automatic updates
- What a staging environment is for
- The maintenance tasks nobody remembers
- How to update a plugin without breaking things
- What happens when you ignore updates for a year
- Rolling back a bad update
- PHP versions, the update nobody talks about
Hosting
What your host covers, what it does not, and where the line actually sits. 6 articles.
Running your site
Costs, plans, reports and ownership. The business side of keeping a site alive. 8 articles.
- What a WordPress maintenance plan should include
- DIY vs hiring help, an honest comparison
- What to ask before hiring someone to manage WordPress
- How much should WordPress maintenance cost
- The monthly report you should be getting
- Who owns your website, and how to check
- WooCommerce sites need more maintenance, not less
- A yearly WordPress health checklist
Printable guides
The checklists as PDFs. No email required.
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