Once upon a time and not so long ago, blogs looked like blogs and websites looked like websites. You could easily tell them apart.
Then WordPress came along and everything changed. Now, it’s getting more and more difficult to tell the difference between blogs and websites. 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’s under the surface.
(It’s Getting Harder To Tell Websites Built With Web Development Tools Vs ‘Blogging’ Software!)
For many 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, regarding the things 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 options below would you choose?
A) An eye-catching, professional-looking website that turns out to be quite expensive to build, or
B) The same eye-catching, professional-looking site, but at a much cheaper price than the cost of getting site “A” above.
If you selected website “B”, then you need to learn more about WordPress, why WordPress can provide you with an eye-catching website that could cost far less to build than websites which use other web editing applications … and how to tell the two types 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 that is ideally suited for all types of 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 knowledge to use, yet it offers many helpful features that make your web site highly 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 currently being powered by WordPress, chances are that if you already own a website, your site is also driven by the WordPress CMS.
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 site 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 very little cost?
The Easy Way To Tell If Your Web Site Runs On WordPress
Do you need to know if your website was built using WordPress? Maybe you’ve come here because you’ve read 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 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 some simple methods you can use to quickly tell if sites are built using WordPress:
Check Your 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 telltale footprints that the site was built using WordPress …
(Viewing the page source code using Firefox)
Let’s say that you are surfing the web and you come across a web site that you like, and you’re wondering if the site runs on WordPress …
First, bring up the site’s source code on your screen, using the methods described above.
In the source code, you can search for words like “wp-content” either by scanning the code visually …
Or using your browser’s “Find” function …
(Use the Firefox browser ‘Find’ function)
This will quickly tell you if the site runs on WordPress or not.
Note: If you do not locate the words “wp-content” within the page source code, it doesn’t mean that it’s not a WordPress site.
There are other ways to tell if the site was built using the WordPress software, as we will soon discuss.
As the focus of this article is to try and help non-technical users, however, we have listed below a number of easier methods you can use to check if your website is built using WordPress other than looking at the source code.
Just Ask Your Web Developer
While this may seem like the most obvious thing to do, a number of web development companies, for whatever reason, will 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 developer or whoever built your web site if it runs on 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 site that you really like while browsing online and you really need to know if the site was built with WordPress?
Check Below Footer
If the site uses a WordPress theme where the theme templates have not been edited, you will often find a “Proudly powered by WordPress” notice showing in the footer area …
(Proudly Powered by WordPress)
If these simple methods aren’t helpful to you, here are some other ways of identifying WordPress sites …
Online Tools That Can Tell You If A Website Uses WordPress
Here are a couple of tools that will tell you if a website uses WordPress or not, and what themes or plugins the site uses …
Is It WordPress? – WordPress Site Checker
(Is It WordPress? – WordPress Checker)
Is It WP? is a free tool that can check if a website was built with WordPress or not.
Using this site is super easy. Just type in or paste in the address of the site into the search field and click the button.
It will search through the page code on the URL and tell you if the site was built using WordPress, and if so, which version of WordPress it is currently using …
If the web site is not a WordPress-powered website, you will see a message similar to 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 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.com)
If you use a browser such as Firefox or Chrome and would like to be able to instantly tell if the sites that you are visiting use WordPress, then Wappalyzer is a very useful add-on for your web browser.
Wappalyzer identifies what software is installed in 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 an easy browser add-on to install.
Once you have installed the Wappalyzer extension on your web browser, icons will appear in your browser allowing you to see which software is installed on all the sites you visit …
If you see the WordPress icon on the browser menu (as the above screen shot shows), then the site uses WordPress.
(It’s a WordPress site!)
To visit the Wappalyzer add-on site, go 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:
I hope that you have found the above information useful.
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"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