White Screen of Death Fix

This article explains how to fix the WordPress white screen of death when your website shows a blank page instead of your content.

What causes the white screen of death

The white screen appears when WordPress encounters an error but doesn't display the error message. Common causes include:

• Plugin conflicts
• Theme problems
• Memory limit exceeded
• Corrupted files

Step 1: Check if it's your entire site

First, test if the problem affects your whole website:

1. Try visiting your homepage
2. Try visiting a specific page (like yoursite.ie/about)
3. Try accessing your WordPress admin area at yoursite.ie/wp-admin

If only certain pages show the white screen, the problem is likely with specific content or plugins on those pages.

Step 2: Deactivate all plugins

Plugins are the most common cause of white screens:

1. Log into your Web60 cPanel (check your welcome email for login details)
2. Open File Manager
3. Navigate to your website folder, then wp-content
4. Find the "plugins" folder
5. Right-click and rename it to "plugins-disabled"
6. Check if your website loads normally

If your site works now, a plugin caused the problem. Rename the folder back to "plugins" and reactivate plugins one by one through your WordPress admin to find the problematic one.

Step 3: Switch to a default theme

If plugins aren't the issue, your theme might be:

1. In File Manager, go to wp-content/themes
2. Find your active theme folder
3. Rename it by adding "-disabled" to the end
4. WordPress will automatically switch to a default theme
5. Check if your site loads

If this fixes the problem, contact your theme developer or choose a different theme.

Step 4: Check error logs

Web60 keeps error logs that show what went wrong:

1. In cPanel, look for "Error Logs"
2. Check the most recent entries
3. Look for errors that happened when your site broke

Common errors include "memory exhausted" or "fatal error" messages. These give clues about what needs fixing.

Step 5: Increase memory limit

If error logs show memory problems:

1. In File Manager, go to your main website folder
2. Look for a file called ".htaccess"
3. Right-click and edit it
4. Add this line: php_value memory_limit 256M
5. Save the file

This gives WordPress more memory to work with.

If you're still stuck

If these steps don't fix your white screen, contact Web60 support through your client area. Include details about when the problem started and what you were doing when it happened.

FAQ

Q: Will I lose my website content when renaming plugin folders?

A: No, renaming folders just temporarily disables plugins without deleting any content or settings.

Q: How do I know which plugin caused the white screen?

A: After renaming the plugins folder fixes the issue, reactivate plugins one by one until the white screen returns - that's your problem plugin.

Q: Can I prevent white screen errors from happening?

A: Keep plugins and themes updated, avoid installing too many plugins, and test changes on a staging site first.

Q: What if I can't access cPanel?

A: Check your Web60 welcome email for login details, or use the password reset option on the cPanel login page.

Q: Is it safe to edit the .htaccess file?

A: Yes, but make a backup first by copying the file. If something goes wrong, you can restore the original version.

Q: Why does WordPress show a blank page instead of an error message?

A: WordPress hides error messages from visitors for security reasons, but they're still recorded in your error logs.

Q: How long do these fixes usually take?

A: Most white screen issues are fixed within 10-15 minutes using these steps, with plugin conflicts being the quickest to resolve.