Getting the Grips of WordPress White Screen of Death Error

In this tutorial, we are going to explore some easy steps to recover your website, when no longer you have an access to your dashboard. The steps are easy to follow and will surely help you in fixing the issue. But before we directly take you to the steps, let's discuss first reasons behind the occurrence of white screen of death error.

Why Do We Get Such Errors?

In most of the cases, such kind of errors occur when your memory limit has been exceeded. This could be because of the plugins that you have installed with the help of professional WordPress plugin development service on your website to make it function properly. Another reason could also come from poorly coded themes which you have been using for quite a while. Plus, it is quite likely that you might be using a sub-standard web hosting provider which is causing issues now.

Common Ways to Fix Them

• Determine whether your WP is having any redundant plugin or featuring a plugin that is not needed anymore.
• You can even extend the memory space by increasing the PHP limit.
• Check if you have installed, updated or even edited any poorly coded theme which is causing problems continuously.
• If a plugin or theme uses too much memory, you may see white screen of death error.
• If a plugin or theme uses too much memory, you may see white screen of death error. It can be avoided by enabling the debug mode.  

Before you start fixing the issue, make sure you create a complete backup of all the files and database of your website. This way, you would be better prepare for any kind of unexpected situation.

 Let's ponder into the method that can help fix this issue efficiently.        
 

1. Server/Database/Memory Incompatibility Issues

This error is generally known as “Error Establishing the Database connection”. This happens when your WP site is unable to connect with your database. This might be because your server is down, you have recently changed the name/password/ and several other credentials of your website.

If you ever encounter this error on your website, don't panic, it's absolutely easy to fix. All you need is go to your wp admin panel. And add the following code in the wp-config.php file.

define('WP_ALLOW_REPAIR', true);

Once you add this code, you'll be provided with some options that help you optimize your database via admin panel.

Another issue which could disable your website is when your memory gets exhausted. When this error happens, your screen displays a message like this:

“Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 33554432 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 7680 bytes) in /home/abc…

Exhaustion of memory limit is also one of the reasons behind the occurrence of white screen of death errors. This could be fixed using the following code to your wp-config.php file.

define('WP_MEMORY_LIMIT', '32M');

2. Disabling Incompatible Plugins

The most common reason behind the emergence of white screen of death is when you end up installing an outdated plugin that is just not compatible with the current version of your WordPress theme. When it's the plugin that causes the error, it locks you out and restrict your access to the admin panel from where you can deactivate the error prone plugin.

However, you still have a solution for this. Using FTP, you can navigate to the plugin folder stored in the WP-content directory and rename it. This way, all the plugins of your website will be deactivated and you can conveniently access your admin panel. Remember, once all the plugins get deactivated make sure you undo the name changed. After this, enable the plugins, so that you could identify and delete plugin which is causing the problem.

3. Theme Causing Errors

If the plugin troubleshooting does not restore the issue, then it's the theme which is responsible for the error. If you have recently performed some edits in functions.php file or have gone through a WordPress theme customization and have installed any error prone theme then you might receive white screen of death error. Here too you are not allowed to directly access the theme section and fix the issue. So, using FTP software, you can check if the theme is properly installed or not and then change the theme name accordingly. This way, your WP site will switch back to the default theme and error will get fixed. Then you can proceed to fix the issues that are causing troubles.

The above mentioned steps will help you in fixing the white screen of death error emerging on your WordPress website. This way you'll be able to bring back your site online and update it accordingly.