It used to be that blogs looked like blogs and websites looked like websites. One could easily tell the difference between the two.
Then the WordPress CMS came along and revolutionized online publishing. Now, it’s becoming increasingly harder to tell the difference between what applications are being used to build the two. Not so much in terms of what the sites are being used for, but in terms of website design and also being able to tell what type of web application is actually powering the site.
(Can You Tell Which Application A Website Has Been Built With?)
For many 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 areas that matter to most website owners, like web development costs, ease of use, ability to maintain the site up-to-date, managing web content, etc.
Think about this …
Which of the options below would you choose?
A) An eye-catching, professional-looking website that is actually expensive to build, or
B) The same eye-catching, professional-looking site, but at a cost that is significantly less than the cost of getting option ”A” above built.
If you decided to go with option “B”, then you need to know more about WordPress, why WordPress can give you an attractive, professional-looking and fully functional website that could turn out to be far less expensive to build than websites built using web-building software … and how to tell these two types apart!
WordPress is the world’s leading online publishing platform and content management system (CMS). It is a powerful content management system that is ideally suited for most types of business applications.
Whether your reason for having an online presence is for personal blogging or business use, WordPress is easy enough for a beginner with no technical skills to use and manage, yet it offers an array of helpful functions that make your website more 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, etc.
With almost one in every five websites around the world currently 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 considering getting one built, then wouldn’t it be great to show your web developer an existing website with the design and layout that you like, know that it was built with WordPress and that you can, therefore, get a similar site built for your business to a smaller budget if required?
Tell-Tale Signs It’s A WordPress Web Site And WordPress-Checking Tools
Do you need to know if your website uses WordPress? Maybe you’ve come here because you’ve heard or read about all of the great benefits and advantages of using WordPress, and you’re now wondering if your site was built using the WordPress software, or some other CMS application.
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 some simple ways to tell if sites are powered WordPress:
View The Page Source Code
If you know how to search 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 a tell-tale footprint …
(Viewing web page source code in the Firefox browser)
Suppose that you are surfing the web and you come across a site that you like, and you wonder if the site was built with WordPress …
First, bring up the site’s source code on your screen, using the methods described above.
In the page’s source code, you can search for the words “wp-content” either manually …
Or using the browser’s “Find” function …
(Using Firefox’s ‘Find’ function)
This will quickly tell you if the site was built using WordPress or not.
Note: If you do not find “wp-content” in the source code, it does not necessarily mean that it’s not a WordPress site.
There are other ways to tell if the site runs on WordPress, as we will soon discuss.
As the focus of this post is to try and help non “techies”, however, we have listed below a number of easier methods you can use to check if your web site is built using WordPress other than viewing the source code.
Just Ask Your Web Developer
While this may seem like the obvious thing to do, a number of website development companies, for whatever reason, will build their clients a website and not tell them it’s WordPress.
If you used a website developer or got somebody else to build you a website, just ask your web developer or whoever built your web site if the website has been built with WordPress.
That was easy, huh?
Okay … what if you can’t reach your website developer, or what if you’ve come across a website that you really like while browsing the net and you really want to know if it was built with WordPress?
Powered By WordPress
If the site uses a WordPress theme and the web them template has not been modified, you can typically see a “Powered by WordPress” message shown in the footer section …
(Powered by WordPress – site footer)
If these simple methods haven’t helped you, here are some other ways of identifying WordPress sites …
Online Tools That Tell You If A Website Runs On WordPress
Here are a couple of online applications 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)
Is It WordPress? is a free tool that tells you if a site uses WordPress or not.
Using this site is really quite simple. Just enter the address of the website into the search field and click the button.
The tool will search through the URL pages and tell you if the site was built using WordPress, and if so, it will even tell you the version of WordPress the site is currently using …
If the web site is not a WP website, you will get a message like the one 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.com
(Wappalyzer.com)
If you use a web browser like Firefox or Google Chrome and want to be able to instantly tell if the sites that you are visiting have been built using WordPress, then Wappalyzer is a great add-on for your browser.
Wappalyzer helps you identify what software is installed on the sites you are visiting.
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 easy to install.
Once you have installed the Wappalyzer add-on on your browser, icons will appear in your web browser, next to the site URL allowing you to see which technologies are being used by all the sites you visit …
If you see the WordPress icon displayed on your browser menu (as shown in the screenshot above), then the site uses WordPress.
(It’s a WordPress site!)
Go here to learn more and install Wappalyzer:
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, visit the site below:
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, go here:
We hope you have found this information useful.
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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum