WordPress tip: what to do if it’s too slow/impossible logging into your WordPress admin area?

If something starts going strange or not working on your WordPress blog, one of the most common causes is a plugin.

Written by third parties, plugins are one of the best parts about WordPress – there’s so many of them out there which can add extra features or functionality to a basic install of WordPress. So many of them are invaluable and almost standard when we set up a blog for clients.

Lately, we’ve run into a few problems caused by plugins and thought that sharing them might help you if you end up having the same sort of problem.

Here’s the first tip:

Does your site suddenly become very slow or impossible to log into the WordPress admin area but the rest of your site is running fine?

A plugin could be the cause. Some plugins connect back to the plugin author’s website to see if there are new versions available. Nice and handy to be told when there is one, but not so great when the plugin’s website server is down, or having problems. Because it can’t connect, it may tie up your own admin area as well. This happened recently with aLinks – an awesome plugin – but it stopped others getting into their admin area.

Quick solution: disable the plugin until the other site is back up by moving the plugin folder outside of your WordPress plugin directory. The usual method of disabling by unticking it on the plugins page won’t work if you can’t get into the admin area!