Once upon a time and not so long ago, 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 web publishing. Now, it’s getting more difficult to tell if a site is being powered by a “blogging” CMS application like the WP publishing platform, or if it’s been created using website-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 type of web application is actually powering the site.
(It’s Getting Harder To Tell Websites Built With Web Development Tools Vs ‘Blogging’ Software!)
For many website owners, understanding the difference between a Content Management System application like WordPress and other website-building tools is huge, not so much in terms of the technical differences, but more importantly, regarding the areas that the majority of website owners are deeply concerned with, like web development costs, ease of use, ability to maintain the website 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 price than the cost of getting site ”A” built.
If you picked web site “B”, then you need to learn more about WordPress, why WordPress can give you a beautiful website that will normally turn out to be far less expensive to build than websites which use a website development tool … and how to tell the two types apart!
WordPress is the world’s preferred online publishing platform and content management system (CMS). It is a flexible and powerful CMS that is ideally suited for ”non-techy” website owners.
Whether your reason for having a digital presence is for personal blogging or business use, WordPress is easy enough for a novice with no web design skills to use and manage, and offers an array of helpful extensions that make your web presence more effective in terms of getting your content published, promoting visitor engagement, 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 a website 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 a similar site built for your business for very little cost?
Is My Website WordPress?
Do you need to know if a website is powered by WordPress? Maybe you’ve come to our site because you’ve read about WordPress, and you’re now wondering if your site was built using the WordPress software, or some other website 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 site is powered by WordPress:
Look At 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 an obvious telltale footprint that the site was built with WordPress …
(View the web page source code in the Firefox browser)
Let’s say that you are browsing online and you visit a 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.
After the source code of the page loads on your screen, you can search for words like “wp-content” either manually …
Or using your browser’s “Find” function …
(Use Firefox’s ‘Find’ function)
This will tell you if the site was built with WordPress or not.
Note: If you cannot locate the words “wp-content” in the page source code, it doesn’t necessarily mean that this is not a WordPress site.
There are other ways to find out if the site runs on WordPress, as we will soon discuss.
As the focus of this article is to help non “techies”, however, below you will find a number of easier ways to check if your website is powered by WordPress other than looking through the source code.
Just Ask Your Website Developer
While this may seem like the obvious thing to do, many website development agencies, for whatever reason, will build clients a website and not tell them it’s WordPress.
If you have an existing website and you’re not sure what application is driving it, just ask your developer or whoever built your web site if your website has been built with WordPress.
That was easy, huh?
Okay … what if you can’t get in touch with your webmaster, or what if you’ve come across a website that you really like while surfing the net and you really need to know if the site was built using WordPress?
Check Below The Footer
If the site uses a WP theme and the them template has not been customized, you can often see a “Proudly powered by WordPress” message showing at the bottom of the site …
(Powered by WordPress – site footer area)
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 Uses WordPress
Here are a some sites that can tell you if a website uses WordPress or not, and what themes or plugins the site uses …
IsItWP.com – WP Checker
(IsItWP.com – WordPress Checking Tool)
Is It WordPress? is a free online tool that can tell you very quickly if a website was built with WordPress or not.
Using this site is very easy. Just type the address of the site into the URL field and click the button.
The tool will then 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 has not been built using WordPress, 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 – Web Browser Add-On (Firefox / Chrome)
(Wappalyzer – Add-On For Firefox & Chrome Browser)
If you use a web browser like Firefox or Chrome and want to be able to know if the sites that you are visiting use WordPress, then Wappalyzer is a useful extension for your web browser.
Wappalyzer tells you what software is installed in 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 to install and very easy to use browser add-on.
Once you have installed Wappalyzer, icons will appear in your web browser menu, next to the site URL identifying which technologies are installed on all the sites you visit …
If the WordPress icon shows up on your browser menu (as shown in the screen shot above), then the site uses WordPress.
(It’s a WordPress site!)
Go here to visit the website:
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, go here:
We hope you have found the above information useful.
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