How to fix blank pages in WordPress?

The article guides you on what can be done when WordPress shows the blank page. This problem is also popularly known as the “white screen of death”.

Table of Contents

What is the actual problem?

When you try to view a page on the WordPress site, it shows you a blank page. This problem can occur for only one page, or several pages, or the entire site. Also, it may not allow you to log in.

Resolution to the problem.

Two of the most common causes of appearing a blank page on WordPress sites are :

A malfunctioning plugin
A malfunctioning theme

To fix these problems, you can go on selecting disable plugins one by one until the affected page or pages gets loaded in your browser. Or, if you find that the current theme is causing a problem, then you can revert to the default theme.

# Steps to disable plugins

After logged in as the administrator, try to disable plugins one by one until the problem doesn’t occur anymore. When you find out which plugin is causing the problem, you can update it, or leave it disabled, or even remove it entirely.

Even if you are unable to log in to Administration Screen, still, you need to disable plugins manually. To do this, perform the following steps :

Log in to cPanel.
By using File Manager locate the public_html/wp-content/plugins directory.

Note: In case if you have installed WordPress in a subdirectory, then navigate it to the wp-content/plugins directory in that directory instead.

Each plugin is incorporated into a separate directory and to disable a plugin, rename its directory. For example, in order to disable the Akismet plugin, you can rename the akismet directory as akismet_backup.
Now retest the WordPress site. If the blank page or pages are still appearing then repeat steps 3 and 4, and disable different plugins each time when you locate the cause.
Once you are done with the troubleshooting, ensure that you restore the plugin directories to their original names.

# Steps to revert to the default theme

In case you have tried to disable plugins and still can see blank pages, then the possibility is that the current theme is causing problems.

By logging in as the administrator, change the theme to the default theme. Or, if you are not able to log in as an administrator, then enable the default theme manually. To do this perform the following steps :

Log in to cPanel.
By using File Manager, view the contents of the public_html/wp-content/themes directory.

Note: In case if you have installed WordPress in a subdirectory, then navigate it to the wp-content/plugins directory in that directory instead.

Note the name of the default theme.

Note: The default theme names are usually represented in years and can be spelled out as twentyfourteen, or twentythirteen, etc. If you can see several default themes, then select the most recent theme name.

Now, return to the cPanel home screen.
Locate the Databases section on the cPanel home screen, and click on phpMyAdmin.
On the left-hand side of phpMyAdmin, click on the WordPress database. A list of tables in the database appears.
In the database, click on the wp_options table.
Go to the option_name column and locate the template and stylesheet rows. You can see the option_value settings, in these rows, contains the current theme.
In the template row, double-click the option_value setting, type the default theme that you have obtained in step 3, and then click Enter.
Repeat Step 9, for the stylesheet row. The default theme now gets activated.
Again retest the WordPress site. If the previous theme was the cause of problems, then now the site should work correctly using the default theme.