Troubleshooting WordPress Login Issues
If you’re having trouble logging into your WordPress site, it can be a frustrating and confusing experience. When you are locked out and unable to access your Admin Panel, it can feel pretty scary!
Thankfully, many WordPress login issues can be easily resolved with a few quick troubleshooting steps.
Here’s a quick guide to help you troubleshoot your login issues, so you can get back in and running quickly.
Check for .htaccess File Conflicts
The .htaccess file controls how the Apache web server serves files from its directories. If there is an issue with this file or it has been modified in a way that conflicts with the WordPress login page, you will get a ‘Not Found’ error message.
Generally, .htaccess has been seen as a mystery, but it is in fact quite simple.
To check for any issues here, the easiest thing to do is simply rename your existing .htaccess to something else, such as JANKY_htacces and then attempting to login again.
If this resolves the issue, then you will need to examine what modifications were made in order to cause this conflict in the first place so they can be reversed or corrected.
Disable All Plugins Temporarily
Another potential issue (one that often leads to login issues) concerns plugin conflicts or even conflicts with multiple plugins. To confirm this issue is easy, though.
We recommend disabling all of your plugins temporarily by renaming the ‘plugins’ directory in your WordPress root folder. This will cause any active plugins to no longer function while they are deactivated and should also allow you to login again without issue.
If this resolves the issue then re-enable all by renaming back to ‘plugins’ and then rename each plugin one by one until you find which is causing the conflict, so it can be removed or replaced, or the conflict investigated further, but with admin access.
Disable Your Theme Temporarily
If you’re still having trouble logging in, then we suggest taking a look at your theme. It could be that something in the theme you are using has caused a conflict, or maybe the theme needs updating.
To disable your theme temporarily, via FTP, just rename the theme folder to something else, like BROKE_Avada or old_Divi, whatever your theme is.
If this resolves the issue, then you can at least login again, and begin to investigate the specific errors and issues, update the theme, or reach out to the WordPress theme developers for support.
Check for File Permissions Issues
Another possible cause of WordPress login issues could be incorrect permissions on some of your core files and folders within your WordPress install directory structure (public_html).
When files are loaded into your webserver’s directory structure they will have assigned permissions that dictate who or what has access rights to read, write and execute those files. Incorrectly set permissions can lead to issues such as the one you are seeing with WordPress Login pages.
To check for any permission issues here we recommend checking all of your WordPress Core Files, Theme Files and Plugin Files through FTP/SFTP or whatever system you have set up for accessing these files on your web server (e.g cPanel). Make sure that each of these has their default permission level applied (644 for core wordpress files).
Next steps
If you’ve tried all of the above and are still having trouble logging into your WordPress site, please reach out to us for help. We can take a look at your files and make sure everything is configured correctly so that you can get back up and running as quickly as possible.
