When the “blogging revolution” first began, 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 everything. Now, it’s getting more and more difficult to tell if the site is being powered by a “blogging” CMS tool like the WP platform, or if it’s been built using a web editing application. 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 Websites Are Built With?)
For 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, regarding the things that matter to most website owners, like web development costs, ease of use, ability to maintain the website 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 turns out to be fairly expensive to build, or
B) The same eye-catching, professional-looking site, but at a much cheaper cost than the cost of getting site ”A”.
If you decided to go with site “B”, then you need to know more about the benefits of using WordPress, why WordPress can give you an eye-catching website that could cost far less to build than websites built using website-building software … and how to tell the two apart!
WordPress is the world’s leading online publishing platform and content management system (CMS). It is a powerful and easy-to-use CMS that is ideally suited for small, medium and even large businesses.
Whether your reason for having a digital presence is for personal blogging or business use, WordPress is easy enough for a newbie with no technical skills to use and manage, yet it offers a range of helpful tools that make your web site highly effective in terms of getting your content published, promoting visitor interaction, generating business leads and sales, 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 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 website 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?
Does My Site Run On WordPress?
Do you need to know if a website is powered by WordPress? Maybe you’ve come to this page because you’ve heard or read about all of the great benefits of using WordPress, and you’re now wondering if your site runs on 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 some simple ways to tell if sites are running on WordPress:
Check The Page’s Source Code For Obvious Tell-Tale WordPress Footprints
If you know how to view 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 web page source code in Firefox)
Suppose that you are surfing the web and you visit a website that you like, and you wonder if the site runs on 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 words like “wp-content” either by scanning the code with your eyes …
Or using your browser’s “Find” function …
(Use the Firefox web browser ‘Find’ function)
This will quickly tell you if the site runs on WordPress or not.
Note: If you are unable to find the words “wp-content” within the page source code, it does not necessarily mean that the website is not a WordPress site.
There are other ways to find out if the site was built using the WordPress software, as we will soon be discussing.
As the point of this post is to help non-technical users, however, we have listed below a number of easy ways to check if your web site is built with WordPress other than searching the source code.
Ask Your Webmaster
While this may seem like the 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 WordPress.
If you employed the services of a website developer or got somebody else to build your website, just ask your webmaster or whoever built your web site if it has been built using WordPress.
That was easy, huh?
Okay … what if you can’t get in touch with the person who built your site, or what if you’ve come across a site that you really like while browsing online and you really want to know if it was built with WordPress?
Powered By WordPress
If the site uses a WordPress theme where the theme templates have not been customized, you will typically find a “Proudly powered by WordPress” notice displayed at the bottom of the site …
(Proudly Powered by WordPress)
If these simple methods haven’t helped you, here are some other ways of telling whether a website uses WordPress or not …
Tools That Can Tell You If A Website Is Built With WordPress
Here are a some online applications that will tell you if a particular website uses WordPress or not, and what themes or plugins the site uses …
Is It WP
(Is It WordPress? – WP Website Checking Tool)
Is It WP is a free online tool that tells you if a site runs on WordPress or not.
Using this site is really easy. Just enter the URL of the website into the search field and click the button next to it.
The tool will search through the URL files and tell you if the site was built using WordPress, and if so, which version of WordPress it is currently using …
If the site does not run on WordPress, you will see a message similar to the one 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 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 – Add-On For Firefox / Chrome Browser)
If you browse the net using either the Firefox or Chrome browsers and want to be able to see if the sites that you are visiting are WP sites, then Wappalyzer is a very useful extension to install on your web browser.
Wappalyzer helps you identify what type of 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 an easy to install and very easy to use browser extension.
After installing the Wappalyzer extension on your browser, icons will display in your browser menu identifying which software is installed on the sites you visit …
If you see the WordPress icon on your browser menu (as the above screenshot shows), then the site uses WordPress.
(A WordPress site!)
Go here to visit the Wappalyzer web browser add-on site:
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 you have found the above information 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)