It used to be that blogs looked like blogs and websites looked like websites. One could easily tell the difference.
Then the WordPress CMS came along and changed everything. Now, it’s getting increasingly more difficult to tell blogs and websites apart. 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 Is Powering Your Website?)
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 things that the majority of website owners are mostly concerned with, like web development costs, ease of use, ability to keep the website 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 expensive to build, or
B) The same eye-catching, professional-looking site, but at a much cheaper price than the cost of getting option “A” above.
If you decided to go with web site “B”, then you need to learn more about the benefits of using WordPress, why WordPress can provide you with an eye-catching website that could turn out to be much less expensive to build than websites built using website-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 flexible and powerful content management tool that is ideally suited for most types of business applications.
Whether your reason for having a web site is for personal blogging or business use, WordPress is easy enough for a beginner with no knowledge of HTML to use, and offers many helpful tools that make your web site 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 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, yours is also a WordPress site.
And if you don’t have a website yet, or are considering getting a website 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 to a smaller budget if required?
How Can I Tell If A Web Site Was Built With WordPress?
Do you need to know if your 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 runs on 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 a number of ways to tell if sites are built using WordPress:
Search Your Page’s Source Code For TellTale The WordPress Footprint
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 web page source code using the Firefox web browser)
Suppose that you are browsing online and you visit a site that you like, and you would like to know if the site uses WordPress …
First, bring up the site’s source code on your screen, using the methods described above.
Once the source code of the site 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 browser ‘Find’ function)
This will quickly tell you if the site is powered by WordPress or not.
Note: If you are unable to find “wp-content” in the page source code, it does not mean that the site you’re looking at is not a WordPress site.
There are other ways to tell if a site runs on the WordPress software, as we will soon be discussing.
As the focus 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 powered by WordPress other than viewing the source code.
Ask Your Web Developer
While this may seem like the most logical thing to do, some website developers, for whatever reason, may build their clients a website and not tell them it’s been built with WordPress.
If you have an existing website and you can’t tell what CMS application is driving it, just ask your web developer or whoever built your website if it runs on WordPress.
That was easy, huh?
Okay … what if you can’t reach your website developer, or what if you’ve come across a site that you really like while browsing the net late at night and you want to know if the site was built with WordPress?
Check Below The Footer
If the site uses a WP theme where the site templates have not been modified, you can often find a “Powered by WordPress” message shown in the footer area …
(Proudly Powered by WordPress)
If these simple methods aren’t helpful to you, here are some other ways of telling whether a site runs on WordPress or not …
Tools That Tell You If A Website Was Built Using WordPress
Here are a couple of online applications that can tell you if a website uses WordPress or not, and what themes or plugins the site uses …
Is It WP
(IsItWP.com)
Is It WP? is a free tool that can check very quickly if a website was built using WordPress or not.
Using this tool is super easy. Just paste the address of the site into the search field and click the button next to it.
The tool will then go through the URL pages 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 WP-powered site, you will get 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 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)
If you use a web browser such as Firefox or Chrome and would like to be able to see if the sites that you are visiting are powered by WordPress, then Wappalyzer is a great add-on to install on your web browser.
Wappalyzer helps you identify what type of 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.”
Wappalyzer is also an easy to install and easy to use web browser extension.
After installing Wappalyzer on your web browser, icons will appear in your browser identifying which software is being used by all the sites you are visiting …
If you see the WordPress icon displayed on your browser menu (as shown in the screenshot above), then the site has been built with WordPress.
(This site is powered by WordPress!)
Go here to learn more:
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:
I hope that you have found the above the information in this tutorial useful.
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"These tutorials have so much information and are easy to understand. If you use WordPress or plan to in the future these will help you with everything you need to know." - Valisa (Mesa, Arizona)