Many WordPress users find themselves in need of a fresh start for their websites. Whether it’s due to performance issues, outdated designs, or simply the desire for a clean slate, resetting a WordPress site can be an effective solution.
WordPress doesn’t provide a built-in reset function, which can leave some users unsure of how to proceed. However, there are several methods available to achieve this goal, ranging from plugin-based solutions to manual processes.
Before embarking on a site reset, it’s crucial for users to understand the importance of backing up their content. This step ensures that no valuable data is lost during the process, allowing for a worry-free reset experience. Of course if you’re a testing environment and you don’t need the dummy content, there’s no need of a backup.
By the end of this article, you’ll know exactly how to reset your WordPress site, and maintain control over your content. Ready to get started? Let’s go!
Why Reset WordPress to Default Settings?
Resetting your WordPress site can be a helpful step when you want to start fresh or resolve specific issues. Here are some of the most common reasons why you might want to reset your site:
Cleaning Up After Testing Plugins and Themes
WordPress users often experiment with new plugins or themes to enhance their site’s features. After a while, this can lead to a cluttered site with unused elements slowing it down. Instead of manually removing each plugin, resetting your site can quickly restore it to its default state. This is particularly useful after testing multiple themes or plugins in a local or staging environment, where you want a clean slate to try new setups. This is our main reason when resetting WordPress.
Fixing a Hacked Website
If your WordPress site has been hacked or compromised, resetting the site can help you eliminate malicious code or vulnerabilities. A full reset allows you to wipe out infected files, reset permissions, and start fresh with security-focused plugins and clean installations. Once reset, you can restore your content from a clean backup, ensuring the hacked elements are gone.
Rebranding or Overhauling Your Website
If you’re planning a complete rebrand or a major design overhaul, resetting your WordPress site can be the easiest way to wipe everything clean. This ensures that you start with a blank slate without the clutter of old themes, plugins, or content that no longer aligns with your new vision. For example, if your business has changed direction, resetting allows you to build a site that reflects your new brand, from design to functionality, without dealing with lingering elements from the past. Our suggestion is to first create the new site rebranding in a staging domain, then perform the main domain reset and move the new site design.
Prepping a Site for Sale or Transfer
If you’re planning to sell your WordPress site or transfer it to a new owner, resetting it helps ensure the new owner gets a clean setup without your personal data, custom settings, or any old content. This simplifies the handoff process and gives the new owner the freedom to configure the site to their liking. Resetting also clears out unnecessary data that could cause confusion during the transition.
How to Reset Your WordPress Website
Before proceeding with the site reset, we recommend to the a site backup in case you need to restore the content in the future. There are multiple WordPress backup plugins that could help you with this task.
Resetting Your WordPress Site using the WP Reset Plugin
Step 1:
First thing first, you need to install the WP Reset plugin. Go to your WordPress Dashboard > Plugins > Add New, search for WP Reset, and then click Install Now and Activate it.
WP Reset is a free plugin and one of the most popular for resetting WordPress. We use it on our testing environment when we need a fresh WordPress installation.
Step 2:
After the plugin is active, navigate to Tools > WP Reset.
Scroll down to the Site Reset section. You can select to reactivate the current theme and plugins by checking the options.
To reset your WordPress site, type in the “reset” command in the input field. Then, click the Reset Site button.
After you click, a new window pops up to double-check you’re sure about this. If you’re ready to go ahead, just hit the “Reset WordPress” button. This is your last chance to back out, so make sure you’re 100% certain before doing it.
After a few seconds the site reset will be completed and you’ll be automatically logged out of your site. Login again in WP admin and you’ll see that all posts, pages and images are gone. You can now start your site from scratch.
Manually Resetting Your WordPress Site
If you want to manually reset WordPress site, it involves wiping out the existing database and reconfiguring WordPress from the ground up. This approach gives you complete control over the process and can be useful when you want a total refresh without relying on plugins.
Here’s how you can do it manually:
Step 1: Backup Your Website
Before you dive into resetting your site, make sure to back up everything. This includes your database, media, and theme files. Having a backup will save you in case something goes wrong or if you need to restore any part of your old site later.
Step 2: Create Your New WordPress Database
To reset your site manually, you’ll need access to your hosting account’s cPanel or a similar hosting control panel. Once inside, locate MySQL Databases, which is the tool for managing your WordPress database. Click on it.
Next you’ll see all the databases created on your server. Note your database name and the username associated with your WordPress site as they will be needed when creating the new database. Click the Delete button to remove the database from the server.
You’re still be in the MySQL Databases section. Now you need to create the new database with the same name as the one you deleted and assign the same user name. If you don’t know those, then you can still create the database and assign an user, but they should match the ones inside the wp-config.php file, otherwise WordPress won’t recognize the new database.
Step 3: Delete uploaded images and plugins
This is an optional step. If you don’t need the old images and plugins, you’ll have to login via FTP to your server ( you can use a FTP client like FileZilla ), go to wp-content and remove the uploads and plugins folders.
Step 4: WordPress Installation Step
Now we need to populate the new database we created in Step 2 with the default WordPress tables. To do that, we’ll have to run the WordPress installation script.
In your browser type your site URL followed by /wp-admin/install.php . This will run the WordPress installation script, were you’ll select the language and admin credentials.
Once the installation is complete, log into your WP dashboard and test everything to make sure it works correctly. Now you can start working on your website, add new theme, plugins, upload images etc.
Conclusion
Resetting a WordPress site can be a powerful solution when a fresh start is needed. Whether users are clearing out old data, fixing persistent issues, or preparing for a redesign, the process is simpler than it may seem. They can choose to reset their site using a plugin for a quick fix or go the manual route for more control over each step.
Before doing it, it’s crucial for users to back up their content to avoid losing anything valuable. It’s important to remember that resetting doesn’t have to mean starting from scratch – backups can bring back important content after the reset. Whether someone is rebranding, recovering from a hack, or simply cleaning up test installations, resetting a WordPress site gives them the flexibility to start fresh.
Once a site is reset, the owner can focus on building something new, optimized, and aligned with their vision.
