It used to be that blogs looked like blogs and websites looked like websites. You could easily tell the difference between the two.
Then WordPress came along and changed all this. Now, it’s getting increasingly harder to tell if the website is running on a “blogging” CMS software application like the WP CMS, or if it’s been developed using a traditional website building software tooltool. Not so much in terms of what the sites are being used for, but in terms of web design and also being able to tell what’s “under the hood”.
(Can You Tell Which Application A Website Has Been Built With?)
For website owners, understanding the difference between a Content Management System tool like WordPress and other website-building software is huge, not so much in terms of the technical differences, but more importantly, in terms of the things that matter to most website owners, such as web development costs, ease of use, ability to keep the site up-to-date, managing content, etc.
Think about this …
Which of the options below would you choose?
A) An eye-catching, professional-looking website that is expensive to build, or
B) The same eye-catching, professional-looking site, but at a much cheaper cost than the cost of getting option “A” above.
If you went with site ”B” above, then you need to know more about the benefits of using WordPress, why WordPress can provide you with a beautiful website that will probably turn out to be much less expensive to build than websites built using other web development tools … and how to tell these apart!
WordPress is the world’s most popular online publishing platform and content management system (CMS). It is a powerful and easy-to-use CMS platform suitable for small, medium and even large businesses.
Whether your reason for having a website is for personal blogging or business use, WordPress is easy enough for a beginner with no technical skills to use, and offers an array of helpful extensions that make your website highly effective in terms of getting your content published and indexed by search engines, promoting visitor interaction, generating business leads and sales, enhancing your site’s capabilities, scalability, etc.
With almost one in every five websites around the world being powered by WordPress, chances are that if you already own a website, yours is also a WordPress site.
And if you don’t have a website yet, or are thinking of getting one built, then wouldn’t it be great to show your web developer an existing site with the design and layout that you like, know that it was built with WordPress and that you can, therefore, get something similarly built for a much smaller cost?
How Can I Tell If My Website Was Built With WordPress?
Do you need to know if your website was built using WordPress? Maybe you’ve come to our site because you’ve read or heard wonderful things about WordPress, and you’re now wondering if your site runs on WordPress, or some other content management system.
Also, have you ever looked at a competitor’s website and wondered what they’re doing to try and get better results online?
Knowing if your competitor’s site is built with WordPress can tell you a few things about their strategies and methods, such as what themes or plugins they are using.
Here are a number of ways to tell if sites are built using WordPress:
Look At Your Page Source Code
If you know how to bring up the source code of a web page (e.g. Firefox Menu > Web Developer > Page Source if using Firefox, or Google Menu > More Tools > View Source if using Google Chrome), you can look for tell-tale footprints …
(Viewing web page source code using the Firefox browser)
Let’s say that you are surfing the web and you come across a website that you like, and you would like to know if the site is built with WordPress …
First, bring up the site’s source code on your screen, using the methods described above.
Once the source code of the page loads on your screen, you can search for the words “wp-content” either by visually scanning the code …
Or use your browser’s “Find” function …
(Use the Firefox web browser ‘Find’ function)
This will tell you if the site was built with WordPress or not.
Note: If you do not find “wp-content” in the source code, it doesn’t necessarily mean that this is not a WordPress site.
There are other ways to tell if the site runs on WordPress, as we will soon see.
As the point of this post is to help non-technical users, however, we have listed below a number of easier ways to check if your web site is built with WordPress other than looking at the source code.
Ask Your Webmaster
While this may seem like the obvious thing to do, a number of web developers, for whatever reason, may build their clients a website and not tell them it’s been built with WordPress.
If you used a website developer or got somebody else to build you a website, just ask your webmaster or whoever built your web site if it was built using WordPress.
That was easy, huh?
Okay … what if you can’t get in touch with your website developer, or what if you’ve come across a website that you really like while browsing online and you would like to know if it was built with WordPress?
Check Below Footer
If the site uses a WordPress theme and the web theme templates have not been edited, you will often find a “Powered by WordPress” message showing below the footer area …
(Proudly Powered by WordPress)
If these simple methods haven’t helped you, here are some other ways of telling whether a website uses WordPress or not …
Tools That Can Tell You If A Website Has Been Built With WordPress
Here are a couple of tools that can tell you if your website uses WordPress or not, and what themes or plugins the site uses …
Is It WP
(Is It WP – WordPress Checking Tool)
Is It WP is a free online tool that can tell you very quickly if a website uses WordPress or not.
Using this site is very simple. Just type in or paste in the URL of the website into the URL field and click the button.
The tool will search through the site code and tell you if the site was built using WordPress, and if so, it will even tell you the version of WordPress it is currently using …
If the web site was not built using WordPress, you will see a message like the one shown below …
To use this tool, go here:
Advanced WP Theme Checker by Satori
(WordPress Theme Detector)
WordPress Theme Detector by Satori Studio is a free tool that can help determine whether or not a website uses WordPress as its CMS engine; it will also tell you which theme the site is using and provide a link to the theme’s official page.
To use this tool, paste the URL of a web page (it doesn’t have to be the home page) into the ‘Enter website URL’ field and click on the ‘What WordPress theme is that?’ button …
(Enter website URL and click the button)
The Theme Detector will automatically scan the website and output its theme information …
(WordPress Theme Detector displays theme results)
If a website is built with WordPress but the theme is too customized to contain any traces of its origins, the Detector will still let you know it’s a WP site by outputting a message on the right.
(Modified WordPress theme message)
If the website is not using WordPress at all, the tool will also let you know …
(This website is not WordPress)
You can try the Detector yourself by visiting this link:
Wappalyzer
(Wappalyzer – Add-On For Firefox & Chrome Browser)
If you use either the Firefox or Chrome web browser and would like to be able to tell if the sites that you are visiting are powered by WordPress, then Wappalyzer is a great extension to install on your browser.
Wappalyzer helps you identify what type of software is installed on the sites while you are browsing.
According to their website …
“Wappalyzer is a browser extension that uncovers the technologies used on websites. It detects content management systems, eCommerce platforms, web servers, JavaScript frameworks, analytics tools and many more.”
It’s also an easy browser extension to install.
After installing the Wappalyzer add-on on your browser, icons will appear in your browser allowing you to see which software is installed on all the sites you are visiting …
If the WordPress icon displays on your browser menu (as the above screenshot shows), then the site uses WordPress.
(It’s a WordPress site!)
Go here to visit the Wappalyzer web browser add-on site:
SpyBar
(SpyBar – Browser Addon For WordPress)
SpyBar is a browser addon that lets you ‘reverse engineer’ any WordPress site you visit and see which WordPress plugins and themes are being used, right inside your web browser …
(SpyBar – Discover WordPress Plugins And Themes Used By Your Competitors)
SpyBar can be installed as a browser extension on Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox and is compatible with PC and Mac.
To download or learn more about SpyBar, go here:
Plugin Sniper
(Plugin Sniper – Find out what plugins a WordPress site is using)
Plugin Sniper lets you find out what plugins a WordPress site is using. This is a useful tool if you want to know what WordPress plugins are being used by your competitors.
Plugin Sniper is also a useful tool for researching what kinds of plugins businesses in certain niches are using …
(Search WordPress sites by categories and location)
To download or learn more about Plugin Sniper, visit the site below:
I hope that you have found the above the information in this tutorial useful.
***
"Wow! I never knew there's so much to learn about WordPress! I bought one of the WordPress for Dummies three years ago, such authors need to be on this course!" - Rich Law, Create A Blog Now