It used to be that blogs looked like blogs and websites looked like websites. You could easily tell the difference between the two.
Then the WordPress CMS came along and changed all this. Now, it’s becoming more and more difficult to tell if a site is being powered by “blogging” tools like the WP CMS, or if it’s been built using web-building software. 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 surface.
(Can You Tell Which Application Is Powering Your Website?)
For website owners, understanding the difference between a CMS application 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, such as web development costs, ease of use, ability to maintain the site up-to-date, managing web content, etc.
Think about this …
Which of the following options would you choose?
A) An eye-catching, professional-looking website that is expensive to build, or
B) The same eye-catching, professional-looking website, but at a cost that is significantly less than the cost of getting option “A” above.
If you selected site “B”, then you need to learn more about WordPress, why WordPress can provide you with an expensive-looking website that could turn out to be far less expensive to build than websites built using a web development tool … and how to tell these apart!
WordPress is the world’s leading online publishing platform and content management system (CMS). It is a flexible and powerful CMS 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 novice with no knowledge of web coding to use and manage, and offers many helpful add-ons that make your website more effective when it comes to getting your content published and indexed by search engines, promoting visitor interaction, generating business leads and sales, enhancing your site’s functionality, 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, your site is also driven by WordPress.
And if you don’t have a website yet, or are considering getting one built, then wouldn’t it be great to be able 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 quite inexpensively?
How Can I Tell If My Site Was Built With WordPress?
Do you need to know if a website was built using WordPress? Maybe you’ve come to our site because you’ve read or heard wonderful things 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 a number of ways to tell if a website has been built with WordPress:
View 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 an obvious telltale footprint …
(How to view your 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 was built using 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, search for the words “wp-content” either manually …
Or use your browser’s “Find” function …
(Using the Firefox browser ‘Find’ function)
This will tell you if the site is powered by WordPress or not.
Note: If you cannot find “wp-content” within the source code, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s not a WordPress site.
There are other ways to find out if the site was built using WordPress, as we will soon discuss.
As the point of this post is to try and help non “techies”, however, below you will find a number of easy methods you can use to check if your web site is built with WordPress other than looking through the source code.
Simply Ask Your Website Developer
While this may seem like the most logical thing to do, a number of website developers, for whatever reason, will build their clients a website and not tell them it’s WordPress.
If you have an existing web site and you’re not sure what application is driving it, just ask your webmaster or whoever built your web site if it has been built with WordPress.
That was simple, huh?
Okay … what if you can’t reach your webmaster, or what if you’ve come across a website that you really like while surfing online and need to know if the site was built with WordPress?
Powered By WordPress
If the site uses a WordPress theme and the templates have not been modified, you will often find a “Proudly powered by WordPress” message showing at the bottom of the site …
(Proudly Powered by WordPress)
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 Is Built With WordPress
Here are a some sites that will tell you if a website uses WordPress or not, and what themes or plugins the site uses …
IsItWP.com – WordPress Checker
(Is It WordPress? – WP Website Checking Tool)
Is It WordPress? is a free tool that can tell you very quickly if a website uses WordPress or not.
Using this tool is really quite easy. Just type in or paste in the address of the website into the URL field and click the button.
The tool will search through the URL and tell you if the site was built using WordPress, and if so, it will even tell you which version of WordPress the site is currently using …
If the site is not a WP-driven site, you will get a message similar to the one shown in the screenshot below …
To visit this site, 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 – Add-On For Firefox & Chrome Web Browser
(Wappalyzer – Extension For Firefox / Chrome Web Browser)
If you browse the net using either the Firefox or Chrome browsers and would like to be able to instantly tell if the sites that you are visiting are WP sites, then Wappalyzer is a very useful add-on to add to your browser.
Wappalyzer identifies 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 a very easy add-on to install.
After installing Wappalyzer on your web browser, icons will appear in your browser menu identifying which software is installed on all the sites you visit …
If the WordPress icon displays on the browser menu (as the above screen shot shows), then the site uses WordPress.
(It’s a WordPress site!)
Visit the Wappalyzer browser extension website here:
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:
We hope you have found the above the information in this tutorial useful.
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