WordPress Address vs. Site Address: What’s the Difference?

You might have noticed that there is a field labeled “WordPress Address” and “Site Address” if you’ve ever poked about it in the general settings of WordPress. If so, this is because WordPress includes both of these addresses. Both versions include the same information, which is why many newcomers are curious about the distinction between the two. Today, we are trying to provide a solution to that particular topic and even demonstrate how you can modify the information included in these fields.

What Is the WordPress Address?

The term “WordPress Address” refers to the directory in which all of the individual documents and folders that make up your website are kept. Everything from your plugins & customizations to your media assets is included in this category. This place stores each and every one of the files on your computer. The majority of web hosts will, by default, save this information immediately in the public HTML directory of your primary domain name, which is known as the webroot. On the other hand, it is mobile and may be transferred to a new area. Changing this setting will result in a new WordPress address. For illustration’s sake, we’ll pretend that your website address is “xyz.com” and also that you moved all of your WordPress files into a folder labeled “Test.” The new address for WordPress would be “xyz.com/Test,” or to be more generic, the address would’ve been whatever your domain name is, followed by a forward slash as well as the name of the folder.

What Is the Site Address?

The Uniform Resource Locator (URL) is what users will need to enter into the address bar of their web browsers in order to access your website. This address will be linked to all of the files that are part of your WordPress installation, and for the vast majority of users, it will be their domain name. Now, the reason I mentioned “majority” is due to the fact that it is possible to alter the Site Address. In point of fact, you could even move them to different websites using this method. Having said that, this scenario is extremely unusual due to the fact that none of your active links will continue to function, and they cannot be accessed.

Updating the name of the website is, for all intents and purposes, the same thing as deleting the previous version of the website and beginning fresh. This can completely wipe off the ranking that your website now has in search engines. It is not suggested, though, unless you intend to begin the process all over again.

What’s the Difference?

To briefly clarify, the WordPress location is the location where all of your core WordPress files are stored, whereas the Site Address is the actual URL that site visitors need to type into the address bar of their web browsers in order to visit your webpage. Both of these could be altered, but the changes shouldn’t be made until after a thorough comprehension of the desired outcome has been achieved.

When Should I Change My WordPress URL?

Updating the URL of a website is a major undertaking that can severely damage your search engine optimization (SEO), but this does not mean that you should never make this change. There are many different contexts in which it is advisable to proceed in this manner. The following are a few of the primary reasons why so many web pages do it:

Business New Title

The name of your webpage will normally be yourbusinessname.com if you run a typical company. It is, however, rather normal for smaller businesses to go through name changes during the course of their existence. And this might be a catastrophe for the business you’re running. Customers will almost always operate on the assumption that your company name is the URL. When this isn’t the case, it makes it more difficult to locate the webpage in question. This is by far the most typical justification for a website to change its URL.

A Questionable Reputation

In this day and age, unfortunately, it is incredibly simple to acquire a poor reputation, and word could travel at an alarmingly rapid rate. It is possible that this was the consequence of a series of honest blunders, but it is also possible that it was the product of predatory acts. A webpage that has a poor reputation will not receive any traffic, no matter what. If you are conscious that this is the situation, it is strongly recommended that you alter the URL of your webpage as well as the layout of it so that it is no longer recognized as belonging to you. This provides you with an additional opportunity to make a good first impression.

Your Title Does Not Anymore Accurately Reflect Your Content

When a webpage is first launched, an image or concept is usually in mind. Having said that, it is possible that these things will shift over the course of time. It’s possible that your website’s URL won’t make sense once you change the emphasis of your blog, even though you may see a significant uptick in traffic as a result of the shift. For instance, you could have begun writing a blog on baking and later chose to expand your coverage to include other themes, such as grilling. Then you realized that all of your content involving grilling was doing better than the stuff about baking. As a result of this, you make the decision to concentrate solely on grilling, but the webpage can no longer make use of the baking URL. Changing the URL of your WordPress site is an excellent idea.

How to Modify the Website Address for WordPress:

The great news is that altering the URL of your WordPress site is not only possible but also very simple. And there are actually a few other approaches to take, which I am going to show you now. Changing the URL of your WordPress site will result in a significant amount of additional work. Every one of your links will suddenly stop working, and you’ll have to configure redirects immediately. If the necessary adjustments are not made right away, this might severely impact traffic. Do this only if you have a well-defined strategy in place.

Method 1: General Settings

The WordPress address, as well as the site address, can be found in the general settings. Both of these could be edited within this area, making it the most convenient way to make changes to this data. Simply navigate to the left-hand admin panel, click on Options, and then pick the General option from the drop-down menu. You will discover two text boxes at the very top of the page; one will include the WordPress Address, and the other will contain the Site Address. Proceed to the next method if these checkboxes do not have a checkmark on them. Changing the address in these boxes to point to the new URL is all that needs to be done on your end.

Method 2: Edit WP-Config :

Now, if your checkboxes were blanked out when you were working with the previous method, this is because the URL of your webpage is hardcoded into the wp-config file of your webpage. There is no need to be concerned because there is no difficult coding required. Copying and pasting two lines of code that contain the new URL is the only thing required of you to complete this step.

The WP HOME variable is used to refer to the URL of WordPress, whereas the WP SITEURL variable is used to refer to the address of the site. Replace “EnterURL Here” on both lines with the URL you want to direct traffic to. At this point, all you need to do is include it in your wp-config files. Let’s get started by signing into the cPanel and selecting the File Manager option from the menu that appears. Through the use of the File Manager, you would also have access to all of the files that are associated with your webpage. To access your WordPress installation, navigate to the public html directory or the folder of your choice that contains it. Find the wp-config file, right-click it, and choose the Edit option from the context menu.

A reminder to create a backup copy of the file will show up in a window of its own before you may change it. In the event that you make a mistake, you will be able to recover it using this method. To proceed, select the “Edit” button from the menu. Once you have gained access to the file, scroll all the way down until you see the text “That’s all, stop editing! Happy blogging.” Copy the lines of code and paste them directly above this comment. Once more, you need to update the portion of the code that says “EnterURLHere” to your actual URL. This may be done by replacing the text in the brackets with your URL. If you don’t change it, the address of your website will be “EnterURLHere,” which would be a terrible mistake. When you are finished, click the “Save Changes” button that is located in the top right corner of the screen. What Should Be Done Following the Modification of the WordPress URL . Updating the URL of your webpage is a significant undertaking, and either you or your team have a lot of work cut out for them. After the URL was changed, there are a few things that you need to be aware of, so let’s have a look at them.

Set up 301 Redirects :

Whenever it comes to making changes to the URL of a website, Google suggests employing the use of 301 redirects in order to ensure a smooth transition. To put it another way, if anybody attempts to access the previous URL, they will be taken to the new one when they do so. Not only is this helpful to visitors, but it’s also beneficial to search engines. A search engine may need a significant amount of time to index your newly created URLs; however, using redirects may assist in accelerating this process.

Bring Your Email Newsletter and Subscriptions Up to Date

If you provide your audience with newsletters on a regular basis, as you should, then you are responsible for keeping the links contained inside those newsletters current. If you do not change this setting, all of the links in your emails will be broken. This will almost certainly cause your message to be classified as spam. Or subscribers may just elect to unsubscribe. Simply log in to the email management provider you use, such as Mailchimp, and edit the templates you make use of to include the new URL.

Upgrade Advertising Links

If you have adverts that you pay for running on Google, Facebook, or anywhere else, you need to make sure that you really make an effort to change those advertisements with the new URL. If you don’t have a redirect set up, then all of those clicks are for nothing; there’s no point in doing them. It’s even possible that it will convince those folks to steer clear of your brand in the future. The most unfortunate part is that while paying for these services, you are unable to enjoy their benefits.

Make a new XML sitemap for the website.

You should already have a sitemap if you have been optimizing your website for search engine results (SEO) in the past. This is essentially a map of your website, and it lists all of the links that lead to the various posts and pages on your site. It can be used by search engines to locate all of the pages that they need to index on their websites. However, given the recent modification to the URL, it is no longer relevant. You will need to make a new one, which can be done quickly using a plugin such as Yoast. After you have done so, you will also need to send it to Google so that they can assist in accelerating the process. These Plugins Might Be of Use. There are dozens of plugins available for WordPress that could assist in making this process easier to handle. It goes without saying that the requirements of each website are different; however, the following are some of the most helpful plugins that should be considered.

Redirection:

With over two million active installs, the Redirection plugin is the most popular plugin for setting up redirects in WordPress. It may be found in the plugin directory. It is capable of handling everything, from the most fundamental redirects to the most complex conditional redirects. After altering the URL, you absolutely need to have a redirection plugin installed and set up so that it is ready to go. This plugin has a proven track record of success and features an intuitive user interface that will make the procedure much simpler. Additionally, there is no charge whatsoever.

Broken Link Detector:

Even if you are not planning to change your website’s URL, it is still a good idea to have the Broken Link Checker plugin installed on your site because it is one of the most helpful plugins available. It examines all of the links on your website, both external, and notifies you if any of them are not working properly. This is very helpful when transferring URLs because otherwise, all of your internal links would no longer function properly after the switch. Instead, you need to ensure that every single one of your internal links is broken unless you have redirects already set up. This assists you in identifying any problems that may exist with the redirects that you have set up. Before making any changes to the URL, it is a good idea to use the Export All URLs tool. It gives you the ability to export a comprehensive list of every URL on your website, which will be of use to you when you are setting up redirects after the changeover. After all, you won’t be able to read the old URLs for much longer, so having a list of things you can use to check your own work is going to be quite helpful. WordPress Allows you Completely Customizable Content

Conclusion:

One of the primary reasons for WordPress’s status as the most widely used content management system in the world is that it can be easily customized. Everything in WordPress can be personalized and includes the web address of the platform itself. Not only is it possible for you to change the URL itself, but you can also change the structure of the permalinks entirely. Because WordPress puts such a large collection of plugins at your disposal, any adjustments you make to your site are always simple and straightforward to implement. Why was it necessary for you to alter the address of your WordPress site or your WordPress address? What actions did you take to ensure a seamless transition between URLs, and how successful were they?