Have you encountered the 500 Internal Server Error in WordPress? 500 Internal Server Error is one of the common WordPress errors, and when beginners encounter this error and cause the site to crash, they often do not know how to fix it. Therefore, in this tutorial, we are going to teach you the reasons for the occurrence of 500 Internal Server Error, and how to fix the 500 Internal Server Error problem.
500 Internal Server Error refers to the internal server error, no matter your website is using WordPress or not, any web page placed in the server may occur this error.
When this kind of internal server error happens, it will not tell you any reason why it happens, so people often don’t know how to find out the cause of this error.
There are many different types of error codes in the network, such as 500, 502, 503, 504, etc., each of which represents a different error. In the case of 500 Internal Server Error error, it means that the server encountered an unexpected situation and could not return the request from the client host.
In WordPress sites, the 500 Internal Server Error is usually caused by plugins and themes, and can also be caused by corrupted .htaccess files and PHP memory limitations.
For larger companies, they sometimes have their own customized 500 Internal Server Error pages.
Impact of 500 Internal Server Error on SEO
Unlike a 503 error, if a 500 error is not fixed immediately, your error will soon lead to a negative impact on your site’s ranking. When Google indexes your site but keeps returning 500 errors, your original SEO ranking is likely to be affected.
If the 500 Error problem occurs within a short period of time, it will not cause much impact. However, if the error occurs over a long period of time (more than a week), then Google may treat the page as no longer existing and affect your site ranking.
If you are concerned that a 500 Error will cause significant damage to your website, then you should try to resolve it as soon as possible.
How to fix 500 Internal Server Error
If your WordPress site has a 500 Internal Server Error message, how should you troubleshoot this problem? As I said earlier, usually this problem is caused by the problem of WordPress host and database. Therefore, the following will provide the common 500 Internal Server Error occurrence problems, and their respective solutions, I believe that can provide you with some help, so that your site can immediately return to normal.
Reload
When a 500 Internal Server Error occurs, the most common reason is the temporary failure of the WordPress host of the site. Therefore, you usually only need to give it a few minutes and your site will get back to normal.
If you find that the problem can be solved in this way, then you usually do not need to take any further action. However, if the problem keeps recurring, then it is most likely due to a problem with the WordPress host or database.
If you don’t know whether the 500 Internal Server Error is only happening on your computer, you can use “https://downforeveryoneorjustme.com/” to check. This site will tell you whether the site is globally inaccessible or only you are inaccessible.
Sometimes, when you are updating your website theme and plug-in, your website will have a temporary 500 error problem immediately after the theme update. This is caused by the host CPU and memory momentary load exceeding the limit. This is especially common on low budget hosts. If you want to resolve this problem completely, then you need to choose a better web host to host your website.
Check the .htaccess file
For WordPress sites, when a 500 Internal Server Error error occurs, the first thing you can do is check your .htaccess file.
You can troubleshoot by renaming your .htaccess file and regenerating a new one.
You can find the .htaccess file by going to the website’s folder through the cPanel control panel, or you can find it by going to the WordPress host server through FTP or SFTP.
Or, you can start without uploading a new .htaccess file. After you rename it, try revisiting your WordPress site to see if you can troubleshoot the 500 Internal Server Error issue. If you can, then you just need to go to WordPress dashboard > Settings > Permanent Links in the backend of your website, and click the “Save Settings” button in that page, WordPress will automatically generate a new .htaccess file.
Increasing the PHP memory limit
If your PHP memory is maxed out, then this is sometimes the cause of a 500 Internal Server Error. To solve this problem, simply increase the PHP Memory Limit for WordPress.
If the 500 Error error only occurs on the backend page of a WordPress login, then you can solve the problem by increasing the PHP memory limit for WordPress by following these steps.
Go to the wp-config.php file
Add the following code: define( ‘WP_MEMORY_LIMIT’, ‘256M’ );
Save the settings
Alternatively, if you are using a VPS host, you can increase the PHP Memory Limit by modifying the PHP.ini file.
Go into the server root directory
Modify the PHP.ini file (or create a blank PHP.ini file if you don’t have one)
Add the following code: memory_limit = 256M
Save the settings
In addition to the above two ways to increase the PHP Memory Limit, you can also increase the PHP memory limit by modifying the .htaccess file.
Go to the server root directory
Modify the .htaccess file
Add the following code: php_value memory_limit 256M
These are the three common ways to increase the PHP memory limit, just pick one of them and use it.
If you can solve the 500 Error problem by increasing the memory limit, then you have only temporarily solved the problem, not cured it. The best thing to do is to find out why you’re running out of PHP memory on your site, and that’s the right way to debug.
If Increasing PHP Memory Limit does not solve the 500 Internal Server Error problem, then let’s move on to the next section.
Disable all WordPress plugins
WordPress is powerful because of the extensibility of plugins, and this is often the source of problems.
If your site has a 500 Error error, try disabling all plugins first, perhaps one of them, or a compatibility error between plugins, is causing the 500 Internal Server Error problem.
Since your website cannot be accessed normally, you can only access the host folder through a control panel such as cPanel. Or you can access the host server through FTP or SFTP.
After entering the WordPress server, find the “plugins” folder in the “wp-content” folder and rename it to “plugins_old” to disable all WordPress plugins.
The only way to find out the 500 error caused by WordPress plugins is to disable all plug-ins first, and if you can access the site normally after disabling them, then enable them one by one to find out the culprit of the 500 error.
Reupload the WordPress core file
If the above methods do not fix the 500 Error problem, then you can try to re-upload the WordPress core file to solve the problem.
Re-uploading WordPress core files will not modify, delete, or affect the content of your original site, so you don’t have to worry about losing your data if you re-upload.
You can go to the WordPress.org website to find the latest WordPress core files and download them.
After unzipping, you just need to upload the “wp-includes” and “wp-admin” folders and overwrite your current host file, and you’re all set.
Seek help from your hosting provider
If you have tried all of the above methods and they do not solve the 500 Error problem, then you can contact the hosting vendor you purchased from and seek help from customer service technical support to help you find the cause of the occurrence and solve the 500 Internal Server Error problem.
We hope this tutorial will help you fix the 500 Internal Server error.
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How to Quickly Fix WordPress 500 Internal Server Error
Have you encountered the 500 Internal Server Error in WordPress? 500 Internal Server Error is one of the common WordPress errors, and when beginners encounter this error and cause the site to crash, they often do not know how to fix it. Therefore, in this tutorial, we are going to teach you the reasons for the occurrence of 500 Internal Server Error, and how to fix the 500 Internal Server Error problem.
Why does 500 Internal Server Error occur
500 Internal Server Error refers to the internal server error, no matter your website is using WordPress or not, any web page placed in the server may occur this error.
When this kind of internal server error happens, it will not tell you any reason why it happens, so people often don’t know how to find out the cause of this error.
There are many different types of error codes in the network, such as 500, 502, 503, 504, etc., each of which represents a different error. In the case of 500 Internal Server Error error, it means that the server encountered an unexpected situation and could not return the request from the client host.
In WordPress sites, the 500 Internal Server Error is usually caused by plugins and themes, and can also be caused by corrupted .htaccess files and PHP memory limitations.
For larger companies, they sometimes have their own customized 500 Internal Server Error pages.
Impact of 500 Internal Server Error on SEO
Unlike a 503 error, if a 500 error is not fixed immediately, your error will soon lead to a negative impact on your site’s ranking. When Google indexes your site but keeps returning 500 errors, your original SEO ranking is likely to be affected.
If the 500 Error problem occurs within a short period of time, it will not cause much impact. However, if the error occurs over a long period of time (more than a week), then Google may treat the page as no longer existing and affect your site ranking.
If you are concerned that a 500 Error will cause significant damage to your website, then you should try to resolve it as soon as possible.
How to fix 500 Internal Server Error
If your WordPress site has a 500 Internal Server Error message, how should you troubleshoot this problem? As I said earlier, usually this problem is caused by the problem of WordPress host and database. Therefore, the following will provide the common 500 Internal Server Error occurrence problems, and their respective solutions, I believe that can provide you with some help, so that your site can immediately return to normal.
Reload
When a 500 Internal Server Error occurs, the most common reason is the temporary failure of the WordPress host of the site. Therefore, you usually only need to give it a few minutes and your site will get back to normal.
If you find that the problem can be solved in this way, then you usually do not need to take any further action. However, if the problem keeps recurring, then it is most likely due to a problem with the WordPress host or database.
If you don’t know whether the 500 Internal Server Error is only happening on your computer, you can use “https://downforeveryoneorjustme.com/” to check. This site will tell you whether the site is globally inaccessible or only you are inaccessible.
Sometimes, when you are updating your website theme and plug-in, your website will have a temporary 500 error problem immediately after the theme update. This is caused by the host CPU and memory momentary load exceeding the limit. This is especially common on low budget hosts. If you want to resolve this problem completely, then you need to choose a better web host to host your website.
Check the .htaccess file
For WordPress sites, when a 500 Internal Server Error error occurs, the first thing you can do is check your .htaccess file.
You can troubleshoot by renaming your .htaccess file and regenerating a new one.
You can find the .htaccess file by going to the website’s folder through the cPanel control panel, or you can find it by going to the WordPress host server through FTP or SFTP.
You can go to WordPress official website to download the default .htaccess file content.
Or, you can start without uploading a new .htaccess file. After you rename it, try revisiting your WordPress site to see if you can troubleshoot the 500 Internal Server Error issue. If you can, then you just need to go to WordPress dashboard > Settings > Permanent Links in the backend of your website, and click the “Save Settings” button in that page, WordPress will automatically generate a new .htaccess file.
Increasing the PHP memory limit
If your PHP memory is maxed out, then this is sometimes the cause of a 500 Internal Server Error. To solve this problem, simply increase the PHP Memory Limit for WordPress.
If the 500 Error error only occurs on the backend page of a WordPress login, then you can solve the problem by increasing the PHP memory limit for WordPress by following these steps.
Go to the wp-config.php file
Add the following code: define( ‘WP_MEMORY_LIMIT’, ‘256M’ );
Save the settings
Alternatively, if you are using a VPS host, you can increase the PHP Memory Limit by modifying the PHP.ini file.
Go into the server root directory
Modify the PHP.ini file (or create a blank PHP.ini file if you don’t have one)
Add the following code: memory_limit = 256M
Save the settings
In addition to the above two ways to increase the PHP Memory Limit, you can also increase the PHP memory limit by modifying the .htaccess file.
Go to the server root directory
Modify the .htaccess file
Add the following code: php_value memory_limit 256M
These are the three common ways to increase the PHP memory limit, just pick one of them and use it.
If you can solve the 500 Error problem by increasing the memory limit, then you have only temporarily solved the problem, not cured it. The best thing to do is to find out why you’re running out of PHP memory on your site, and that’s the right way to debug.
If Increasing PHP Memory Limit does not solve the 500 Internal Server Error problem, then let’s move on to the next section.
Disable all WordPress plugins
WordPress is powerful because of the extensibility of plugins, and this is often the source of problems.
If your site has a 500 Error error, try disabling all plugins first, perhaps one of them, or a compatibility error between plugins, is causing the 500 Internal Server Error problem.
Since your website cannot be accessed normally, you can only access the host folder through a control panel such as cPanel. Or you can access the host server through FTP or SFTP.
After entering the WordPress server, find the “plugins” folder in the “wp-content” folder and rename it to “plugins_old” to disable all WordPress plugins.
The only way to find out the 500 error caused by WordPress plugins is to disable all plug-ins first, and if you can access the site normally after disabling them, then enable them one by one to find out the culprit of the 500 error.
Reupload the WordPress core file
If the above methods do not fix the 500 Error problem, then you can try to re-upload the WordPress core file to solve the problem.
Re-uploading WordPress core files will not modify, delete, or affect the content of your original site, so you don’t have to worry about losing your data if you re-upload.
You can go to the WordPress.org website to find the latest WordPress core files and download them.
Once you go to the https://wordpress.org/download/ page, the latest WordPress version will be available at.
After unzipping, you just need to upload the “wp-includes” and “wp-admin” folders and overwrite your current host file, and you’re all set.
Seek help from your hosting provider
If you have tried all of the above methods and they do not solve the 500 Error problem, then you can contact the hosting vendor you purchased from and seek help from customer service technical support to help you find the cause of the occurrence and solve the 500 Internal Server Error problem.
We hope this tutorial will help you fix the 500 Internal Server error.
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