A staging site is a private copy of one of your websites at staging.<your domain>. Use it to try out plugin and
theme updates, new features or a redesign before you make the same change on your live site.
Creating a staging site
- In the Control Panel, open Staging sites (in the Websites group).
- Next to the site, choose Create staging site and confirm.
- The copy is made in the background, usually within a few minutes for a normal site. Follow it under Requests.
- When it is done, choose Show password next to the request: your browser asks for this password (user name
staging) when you open the staging site. It is shown only once; save it in your password manager.
What is copied:
- All files of the site, into the folder
staging.<your domain>in your account (visible over SFTP). - For WordPress, the database too: the copy gets a database of its own (the live database's name followed by
_stg), and every address of the live site in it is changed to the staging address, so links, images and logins stay on the staging site. - For other kinds of sites, only the files are copied: the copy still uses the live site's database until you change its settings. Ask us if you need help with that.
If we host your domain's DNS, the name staging.<your domain> is added for you. Otherwise add a CNAME record
named staging pointing to your domain where your DNS is hosted (see Point a domain to our servers); HTTPS is
switched on once the name points to us (SSL/TLS > Enable HTTPS).
What is different on a staging site
- It asks for a password, so only you (and whoever you give the password to) can open it.
- It tells search engines not to index it, and WordPress's Discourage search engines setting is on.
- It sends no email from PHP, and WordPress's scheduled tasks do not run, so a copy of a shop does not mail your customers or process orders.
- A persistent object cache of the live site (
wp-content/object-cache.php) is left out of the copy, because the copy would otherwise share the live site's cache. - It counts towards your disk space like any other files, but not against the number of subdomains in your plan.
Keeping it up to date
Copy live to staging replaces the staging site with a fresh copy of the live site (files, and for WordPress the database). Anything you changed only on the staging site is lost, so do this before you start testing something new.
New password gives the staging site a new password (shown once under Requests); No password removes the protection, so anyone who knows the address can open it.
Moving your changes to the live site
Once a change works on the staging site, make the same change on the live site, for example by updating the same plugin there. To copy files or the database from staging to live yourself, use SFTP or, with SSH access, rsync and WP-CLI; take a backup of the live site first. Copying staging over live from the Control Panel is planned together with backups.
Removing a staging site
Remove deletes the staging site, its files and its database. Your live site is not touched. To keep anything from the staging site, download it over SFTP first.