How to Fix “The Site is Experiencing Technical Difficulties” Error in WordPress

site is experiencing technical error, technical error

Are you looking for a solution to fix the ‘The site is experiencing technical difficulties’ error in your WordPress blog? If yes, then today’s guide will help you resolve this issue.

It is one of the major errors faced by WordPress blog owners, and without knowing the cause of the error, it becomes very difficult to fix this error from your site.

In this in-depth guide, I will discuss why you are seeing this error, what are the causes of this error, and how to resolve it using simple troubleshooting steps.

In today’s guide, you will learn:

  • What is the ‘The site is experiencing technical difficulties’ error?
  • Why does the error occur on your WordPress site?
  • How to detect the source of the error.
  • How to fix the error with different solutions.

Let’s begin the guide!

What is the “Site is Experiencing Technical Difficulties” Error?

“The site is experiencing technical difficulties” is one of the major WordPress errors that means your website is down and both you and visitors can’t access it. Here is what this error looks like:

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Site is experiencing technical difficulties error in WordPress

If this error occurs on your website, then it means you are probably not going to access both your site’s frontend and backend. But don’t worry; with some quick solutions, you can fix this WordPress error.

Why Does This Error ‘This Site Is Experiencing Technical Difficulties’ Occur On WordPress?

There are multiple reasons why this error occurred on your website. Also, it is very important to find the right sources of this error in order to fix it. Finding the right cause root can also help you save time in solving the problem.

So, let’s dive into the major reasons behind the “The site is experiencing technical difficulties” error in WordPress.

1. Plugin or Theme Incompatibility Problem

For continuous improvement, WordPress releases new updates frequently to fix bugs. Along with this, themes and plugins also keep updating frequently to ensure they are compatible with the latest version of WordPress.

If you are using an older version of WordPress, theme, or any plugin, then the issue of theme or plugin conflict or incompatibility can arise.

If you encountered this issue, then you may see a message on your WordPress dashboard like this:

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Incompatible Plugins

Also, the error “the site is experiencing technical difficulties” can arise if you have recently updated any one of these: WordPress core, theme, or plugin because of incompatibility issues.

2. PHP Error

To build and maintain WordPress, a PHP programming language is used. Similar to the plugins or themes, PHP also receives frequent updates to keep your site secure and fast.

The technical difficulty error can also arise because of the older PHP version. Hence, if you are using an outdated version of PHP on your site, this can be a reason for the error. Here is how it looks:

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
PHP Errors on WordPress

3. Server-Side Issue

“The site is experiencing technical difficulties” error can also appear because of issues at your server-side. Servers can give many types of errors and this is one of them.

Sometimes, there is nothing wrong with your end, but still, you will see this error on your site. This can happen due to some problems with your hosting platform.

4. Malware/Virus

In most cases, hackers break your website and gain access to your WordPress site, and can add different kinds of malware to your blog.

In this case, you may encounter the “site is experiencing technical difficulties” error. To solve this, you need to scan your site for any malware or virus.

5. Failed Updates

As a WordPress user, you regularly update your theme and plugins, but sometimes, the updates get interrupted in the middle.

With an instructed delay, your site can get stuck in the maintenance mode, and you can see the error “The site is experiencing technical difficulties” on your WordPress.


How To Detect The Source of the Problem

Before starting the error-fixing process, you can try to detect the source of the error by using several ways:

1. Check Your WordPress Admin Email

For this error, WordPress sometimes sends a detailed email to the admin of the website where the cause of the errors is mentioned. The email will be sent to the admin’s registered email address.

Also, users are advised to check their spam folder if an email is not received in the email Inbox. Still, if you have not received the email, there are also other ways to find the cause of the problem. Keep reading!

2. Enable Debugging Mode

To detect these kinds of complex errors, WordPress offers a great feature known as Debug mode. You enable this Debug mode to perform troubleshooting on your website that helps you find the error.

There are plenty of plugins available that automatically enable the Debug mode. Debug Info and Debug This are the names of a few.

You can also enable the debugging mode by using your web hosting’s cPanel. You have to edit and add a code to your wp-config file.

To do this, first, log in to your cPanel and open the File Manager.

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Open Filemanager

Now, navigate to the public_html folder and find and open the wp-config file as shown in the image below.

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Open the “WP-Config” file

Once the file opens, you have to locate the line: define( ‘WP_DEBUG’, false ) and change the ‘false’ to ‘true’

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Enable WP Debug

Once you save the file, visit your WordPress admin dashboard, and you will see an error message or line at the top of the dashboard that shows the exact file that is causing the error. Here is how it looks:

stdClass::$plugin in /www/WordPress/public_html/wp-contents/plugins/livechat/class-wp.php on line 175.

The above line of error tells us that the issue is on line 152 of the LiveChat plugin.

3. View Activity Log

There are many WordPress users that have enabled the activity log of their website. This activity log tells us what is happening on our WordPress blog with the date and time.

Many times, checking the activity log can solve the “site is experiencing technical difficulties” error. If you have not enabled it yet, you can use plugins like WP Activity Log. After that, you can check the complete activity log of your blog to find any recent changes.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Check Activity Log

Now that you know the error cause, it’s time to move to the next section, where you learn how to fix the problem.

How to Fix “The site is experiencing technical difficulties” Error

With the above guide, we now know that there can be multiple causes of this error and multiple similar solutions to solve it.

Below, I have listed all the working solutions to fix this error. There may be some users who have access to their wp-admin, and where some do have access to it.

So, depending on both situations, I have created an in-depth guide for both types of users:

  • Fix when you have access to wp-admin
  • Fix when you don’t have access to wp-admin

Fix When You Have access to WP-Admin

First, we will start troubleshooting the error for those users who already have access to wp-admin. Also, it will make it easier for these users to fix the error as they can directly fix the problem from the WordPress dashboard.

Before starting the process, I highly recommend you take a complete backup of your website if you do not have one.

Here are the primary locations you need to check:

  • WordPress plugins
  • WordPress themes
  • Any recent update
  • Scan site for malware

1. Check WordPress Plugins

The majority of the time, it is found that plugins are the primary cause of errors. To check if the statement is right, you need to go to your WordPress dashboard and open the Plugins section.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error

Now, select all and then Deactivate all of your plugins.

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Deactivate plugins

After that, simply clear your browser cache and open your site in private or incognito mode. If the site is opening fine that means any plugin is faulty and causing the error.

Now, the next step is to activate plugins one by one, and after every reactivation, check if your site is working fine or not. If any plugin is reactivated, the site doesn’t load, then it means that one plugin is causing the error.

Once you find that faulty plugin, you can deactivate, delete, update, or even downgrade the plugin version. The best option is to remove it from your site if you no longer need it.

2. Check WordPress Themes

If the plugins are not faulty, then you can check your WordPress themes to see if there are some issues there. To check a faulty theme, open your WordPress admin dashboard and navigate to Appearance > Theme.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Check WordPress themes

Here, you need to activate any of the available default themes like Twenty Twenty Two and reload your site in private windows and check if the error disappeared or not. If the error has been removed from the site, it means your previously installed theme is causing the issue.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Activate default themes

3. Check For Any Recent Updates

If you have updated any of your plugins, theme, or WordPress core itself, then this can also cause the ‘site is experiencing technical difficulties’ error.

To check if any recent WordPress update is causing the issue, you can take the help of a rollback plugin like WP Downgrade. Simply install and activate this plugin as shown in the image below.

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Downgrade wordpress version

Now, go to Settings > WP Downgrade and enter any old WordPress version and save changes to perform a downgrade.

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Downgrade WordPress to an older version

To check if any recent plugin or theme update caused the error, you can use the WP Rollback plugin. Simply download it from the WordPress plugin directory and activate it.

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Install & Activate WP Rollback Plugin

After activating the plugin, navigate to your Installed Plugins, and you will see a new option, “Rollback,” on every active plugin.

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Rollback WordPress Plugins

Similarly, you will also see this option on every theme you have installed on your website, as shown in the image below.

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Rollback WordPress Themes

Now, you just need to click on the Rollback option and choose which version you would like to rollback. You will see all the previous versions of that theme or plugin.

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Rollback WordPress Editor

4. Check Site For Malware

Sometimes, malware can also cause this error on your WordPress site. To check this, you can scan your site using a WordPress security plugin. We recommend you use the MalCare plugin, which is an excellent security plugin for WordPress.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Check for Malware using MalCare plugin

MalCare can find and protect your site from any type of malware and attacks like brute force, redirect hack, pharma hack, spam link injections, and session hijacking. To scan your site, go to MalCare (located at the bottom of the WordPress menu) and enter your email address.

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Signup for MalCare

Now, the plugin will start scanning your site automatically as shown in the image below.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Scan Websites using MalCare

If there is no malware, then you will see a similar image as below, where you can see that your site is clean.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Enable Firewall

In case you see malware on your site, MalCare allows you to auto-clean your site to remove any malware. I hope the above solutions resolve the error and get back to your site.

If not, continue reading the article, as now we are going to tell you how to fix the error if you don’t have access to your WordPress dashboard.

Fix When You Don’t Have Access to WP-Admin

In a situation where you don’t have access to your WP-Admin, troubleshooting becomes a bit more difficult and technical. But, here, I will show you how you can still fix the “The site is experiencing technical difficulties” error without WordPress access.

Here are the methods, we will try to use to troubleshoot the error:

  • Disable Plugins
  • Disable Themes
  • Manually Check For Malware

Let’s get started.

1. Disable Plugins

To manually check if plugins are the reason behind the error, open your cPanel and open File Manager. You can also use any FTP client software like FileZilla to access your site’s backend.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Open Filemanager

Now, navigate to public_html > wp-content folder. Here, you will find the plugins folder as shown in the image below.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Open plugin folder

In this step, right-click your mouse on plugins and select rename, and give it any name like Plugins_Off.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Rename plugin folder

In the next step, open your site in private mode and see if the error is gone or not. If it is gone, it means any plugin is causing the problem.

Now that you know that plugins are the cause of the error, it’s time to find out which plugin is faulty. To check this, you have to rename every plugin by one like wordable_disable. After every change, keep your site checking in incognito mode to find that one faulty plugin.

Once you find out the error causing the plugin, delete its folder to remove it from your site.

2. Disable Themes

If plugins are not causing the error, you need to check your WordPress themes. Similarly, navigate to public_html > wp-content. Here, you will find the themes folder.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Open theme folder

Now, rename the themes folder to something like themes_disable. After that, rename your active theme’s folder name like generatepress_disable.

site is experiencing technical error, technical error
Rename theme name

Now, the next is to load your site in a private window and check if the error is resolved. If the error is gone, it means your theme is causing the issue. To resolve the faulty theme, you can contact the theme’s developer.

3. Manually Check For Malware

If you don’t have access to your WordPress dashboard, you can use an online tool like Virus Tool to check if your site has malware or not.

To get started, open the tool, enter your website address, and scan the site for malware or virus.

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Scan for Malware

Now, the tool will show you the detailed result of the security scan. In our case, we don’t have any malware on our site.

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No malware found

What To Do If You Can’t Fix ‘The site is experiencing technical difficulties’ Error?

If you still can’t fix the ‘The site is experiencing technical difficulties’ error, then you can do the following things:

  • You can contact your web hosting provider, as sometimes the issue is with the web hosting server. If you are unable to fix the issue using the provided solutions, then the best solution is to contact the customer support of your hosting provider.
  • WordPress support forums are also a great platform to find solutions to almost every WordPress-related problem. It allows users to post questions and answers.
  • Apart from WordPress forums, there are other online forums where you can find solutions to various problems. Some of the great platforms are StackExchange, Reddit, StackOverflow, and Quora.
  • If you are not a user who can’t handle this much stuff, then you can approach a good WordPress developer. A developer can detect and fix the error without breaking your site.

Final Words

For WordPress users, the ‘The site is experiencing technical difficulties’ error can be very frustrating because, with this error, you can’t access your WordPress dashboard.

In the above guide, you can find some solutions that will help you fix this error. I hope you like this guide and if you face any problems or have any questions then feel free to ask in the comment section below.

Avatar of Sunny Kumar
Sunny Kumar
Hello! I’m Sunny Kumar from New Delhi, India, a tech enthusiast and blogger with an IT degree from IIT-D. My expertise lies in SEO, Cloud Computing, Telecom & Networking, and CEH. I specialize in SEO, WordPress Development, and PC Building. And being a proficient WordPress user, I’m dedicated to delivering quality content and a remarkable user experience.

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