So you have a WordPress website that looks beautiful but for some reason, you feel that it’s quite slow despite using the best servers or hosting services.
Did you know that WordPress comes equipped with a tool to diagnose and improve your site’s health?
The Site Health tool provided by WordPress detects possible performance and security issues. Perhaps with this tool, you can figure out what is slowing down your website or even detect potential threats that you should immediately address.
In this tutorial, we’ll explore how to use the Site Health tool to ensure your WordPress website i always ready to go and free from any form of problems, whether they concern the performance or the security of your website.
Source: Tools: Site Health by WordPress on YouTube
If you would like to see the tutorial for using the Site Health tool in video form, you may refer to the video above done by WordPress on YouTube.
Accessing the Site Health Tool
First, navigate to the Dashboard of your WordPress site and from there, you may be able to see the Site Health widget on your dashboard.
If it is not there, you can alternatively navigate to ‘Tools’ and click on ‘Site Health’. Here, you’ll immediately see an overview of your site’s health status, indicating areas that require attention.
The Site Health page consists of two main tabs: Status and Info.
The status tab displays critical information about your WordPress setup and highlights critical issues that need immediate action, such as security vulnerabilities or performance concerns, as well as recommended improvements to your site.
On the other hand, the info tab lets you delve deeper into the technical aspects of your site, including details about themes, plugins, and server configurations.
Addressing Critical Issues
Should your site health tool show any critical issues, they demand urgent attention and you should try your best to take action as soon as possible.
For any critical issue that you have, on the right side of each issue displayed, you will be able to see an arrow. Click on this arrow to expand the issue’s details to see it.
For instance, if you’re running an outdated PHP version, contact your hosting provider to update it. Remember to back up your site before making any updates.
Other critical issues may include missing required modules, outdated plugins that require updates, or loopback request failures.
Recommended Improvements
In the ‘Recommended Improvements’ section, you’ll find items that enhance security and performance which although not critical, should still be addressed wherever possible.
For example, your current WordPress version may be outdated and the plugins and themes that you have used for your site in the past may still be present despite you not needing them anymore.
Before updating your WordPress version if it is outdated, ensure that you have made a backup of your site.
To update your WordPress version, you can go to “Updates” on your WordPress dashboard, where you can click on the button that prompts you to update to the latest version.
To remove inactive themes and plugins, navigate to ‘Appearance’ to delete inactive themes and ‘Plugins’ to delete inactive plugins respectively.
That’s all for checking your WordPress site’s health using the Site Health tool. Remember to periodically check back on this tool to ensure that your website is free from anything that deteriorates its performance or compromises the site’s security.
For more tutorials on WordPress as well as other WordPress-related tools such as Elementor and WooCommerce, stick around and check out our other existing articles!
Related To:
WordPress Guide: Adding A Video To Your Website
WordPress Guide: How Do I Navigate The WordPress Dashboard To Manage My Website?
