Trouble Shooting a Broken WordPress Theme
If you’ve been visiting my blog over the past couple of weeks you may have found a few things haven’t been working properly. From images not displaying, menu items not being clickable and very slow loading times.
Honestly when something goes wrong with your blog and especially if you find yourself with a broken WordPress theme, which is the first thing a reader sees, it can leave you feeling panicked. You’ll be wondering if you’ll be able to fix it, if you’ll need a fresh WordPress installation (hopefully not!) or if you’ll need to shed out more for a new theme.
Unfortunatly this isn’t the first time I’ve experienced issues with WordPress; I’ve having previously been hacked(!), lost all my data and been unable to access my admin panel!😵 It’s certainly a worrying situation to be in, but I have a few steps that may help fix things with your broken WordPress theme, before you decide to pull the plug on your blog.
Read more: Using phpMyAdmin to restore lost content
1. Back up your WordPress installation.
This is something you should be doing regularly anyway but just in case you’re not or it’s been a while, back up before begining any of these steps.
2. Reinstall your current theme
If it’s an issue with the theme the best thing you can do is reinstall to a previous version or do a fresh installation of the current one. It could be the installation didn’t complete properly, one of the most common causes can be your internet going down.
3. Try switching to one of the default themes (twenty nineteen etc).
If reinstalling your theme didn’t work, try switching to one of the default themes and see if you’re still having issues. This should show you if the problem is with your new theme or something else.
4. Turn off (deactivate) your plugins.
Yes ALL of them. Some plugins functions can interfere with certain themes.
4. Re-activate each plugin individually.
Check your theme after each plugin has been re-activated and you should find the one that’s causing issues.
5. Remove the problem plugin.
Once you’ve identified the problem plugin, deactivate and delete it. For those who are interested, the problem plugin for me turned out to be the Speed Booster Pack.
I hope this helps anyone in a similar situation! It’s very disheartening to put so much work into your blog or website and then find it isn’t working correctly.
14 Comments
Shane Snowdon
August 15, 2020 at 12:14
Great advice
Before installing any plugin always make sure that it is compatible with your WordPress site
There is a tick to say when a plugin is compatible on the install plugin page after you have typed in keyword for your plugin
Lauren
September 8, 2019 at 14:01
This is such a useful post. I am always learning more tech aspects as sometimes I don’t really understand all the technical terms! Thank you for sharing this post!
Alice Megan
September 5, 2019 at 16:39
I’ve stopped playing with my themes! I’m on blogger but I had a complete nightmare with it once and had to let someone else fix it
Whoops!
Kayleigh Zara
September 2, 2019 at 22:08
I’m not with WordPress but this is really good to know should I ever choose to make the switch! Glad it’s working for you now x
Kayleigh Zara 🌟 http://www.kayleighzaraa.com
Jaya Avendel
September 2, 2019 at 22:06
I do not often have trouble with themes but I remember when I was playing with templates in the early days of my blog and I ran into some potholes then! Switching to a default theme usually resets minor troubles. 🙂
Jenny in Neverland
September 2, 2019 at 19:02
Glad to see the theme is fixed now! I did wonder why your images weren’t loading earlier. This is a really informative post for anyone who has the same thing. I’d be completely lost if this happened to me! x
ThatAutisticFitChick
September 2, 2019 at 17:53
What do you use to back up your site and is it free?
I’ve been wanting to back up for a while (there’s a couple of tweaks I want to make) and I can’t remember where I found a blog post about free back ups and how most then make you subscribe to redownload your site, but they had a free one…maybe it was you?
Kim
September 2, 2019 at 18:42
It wasn’t me but I do know a free WordPress plugin, I use it myself. It’s “WordPress Database Backup”; https://en-gb.wordpress.org/plugins/wp-database-backup/
Lisa
September 1, 2019 at 21:05
Ah, plugins. They’re so good but sometimes so bad for a site. You’re absolutely right, uninstalling one by one is the best way to track down what’s going on but it is a complete pain too! I’m so glad you were able to identify what was causing your theme to glitch, and you can never take too many back ups, can you? 🙂 Lisa X
melissa major
August 30, 2019 at 10:07
Great tips that are very handy for sure! I am going to switch to WordPress sone day, so I’ll keep this post in mind for sure.
Mel
( http://www.moonlightmel.co.uk )
Kim
August 30, 2019 at 12:40
Thanks for your comment. 😊 I’ve been a WordPress user for nearly a decade so if you need any help getting it step up, give me a shout.
sophie
August 30, 2019 at 01:09
This is so helpful and handy! I’m going to save this post for if it ever happens to me *touch wood* x
Marie-Céline
August 27, 2019 at 20:12
That sounds like a whole lot of bother. Glad you got it sorted though! Thank you for sharing these tips.
Kim
August 29, 2019 at 18:23
It was awful! But fingers crossed it’s all sorted now. I hope you never find yourself in that situation, but hope these help if you ever are. 😊