How to Fix the WordPress White Screen of Death (Step-by-Step)

You open your WordPress site and all you see is a completely blank white page. No error message. No nothing. Just white.

This is the WordPress White Screen of Death — and it’s one of the most frustrating errors a WordPress site owner can face. The good news is it’s almost always fixable, and in most cases you don’t need to touch your host or call a developer.

In this guide I’ll walk you through every fix, in order from easiest to most technical.

What Causes the WordPress White Screen of Death?

Before fixing it, it helps to understand what’s happening. The white screen usually means PHP hit a fatal error and WordPress couldn’t display anything — not even an error message. Common causes include:

• A bad plugin update or a plugin conflict
• A theme that has a PHP error
• Running out of PHP memory
• A corrupted WordPress core file
• A failed update

The frustrating part is that WordPress shows you nothing by default. That’s the first thing we fix.

Step 1: Enable WordPress Debug Mode

This will make the actual error visible so you know exactly what you’re dealing with.

Connect to your site via FTP or your hosting File Manager and open wp-config.php. Find this line:

define( 'WP_DEBUG', false );

Change it to:

define( 'WP_DEBUG', true );
define( 'WP_DEBUG_LOG', true );
define( 'WP_DEBUG_DISPLAY', true );

Now reload your site. If there’s a PHP error, it will now show on screen instead of a blank page. Read the error — it usually tells you exactly which file or plugin caused the problem.

Once you’ve fixed the issue, remember to set WP_DEBUG back to false before going live again.

Step 2: Deactivate All Plugins

Plugins are the #1 cause of the white screen. The fastest way to test this is to deactivate all of them at once.

Since you can’t access your dashboard, do it via FTP:

1. Go to /wp-content/plugins/
2. Rename the entire plugins folder to plugins_old
3. Reload your site

If the white screen disappears, a plugin was the culprit. Now:

1. Rename the folder back to plugins
2. Go to your dashboard → Plugins
3. Reactivate them one by one, reloading after each one
4. When the white screen comes back, you’ve found the bad plugin

This is the same troubleshooting logic I use whenever I’m doing major plugin testing — as I showed in my post on what happens when you install 50 WordPress plugins on one site.

Step 3: Switch to a Default Theme

If disabling plugins didn’t fix it, your theme might be the problem.

Via FTP, go to /wp-content/themes/ and rename your active theme folder (e.g., mytheme → mytheme_old). WordPress will automatically fall back to a default theme like Twenty Twenty-Four.

If the site loads again, your theme has a PHP error. You can either fix the error in the theme code or switch themes permanently.

This is exactly why I always recommend using a child theme for any customizations — the parent theme stays untouched and recovers easily. If you haven’t set one up yet, read my guide on how to create a WordPress child theme.

Step 4: Increase PHP Memory Limit

Sometimes the white screen is caused by WordPress running out of memory. Add this line to your wp-config.php file just above the line that says /* That's all, stop editing! */:

define( 'WP_MEMORY_LIMIT', '256M' );

Save the file and reload. If memory was the issue, your site will come back immediately.

You can also add this to your .htaccess file if wp-config.php didn’t work:

php_value memory_limit 256M

Step 5: Re-upload WordPress Core Files

If none of the above worked, a core WordPress file may be corrupted — this can happen during a failed update.

1. Download the latest version of WordPress from wordpress.org
2. Unzip it
3. Upload the wp-admin and wp-includes folders to your server via FTP, overwriting the existing ones
4. Do NOT touch the wp-content folder — that’s where your themes, plugins, and uploads live

This replaces any corrupted core files without touching your content.

Step 6: Check Your Hosting Error Logs

If you’re still stuck, your hosting control panel has error logs that show exactly what PHP threw. In cPanel, go to Logs → Error Log. The last few lines will tell you precisely what failed and on which line of which file.

This is also why good hosting matters — cheap shared hosts often have very limited PHP memory and outdated PHP versions that cause these errors more frequently. My guide on how to choose the best WordPress hosting covers what PHP version and memory specs to look for.

Preventing the White Screen in Future

• Always take a backup before updating plugins or themes
• Keep PHP updated to 8.1 or higher
• Use a staging site to test updates before pushing to live
• Don’t install plugins you don’t actually need

If you don’t have a backup routine set up yet, go read my guide on how to backup your WordPress site right now — it takes ten minutes to set up and will save you hours of headaches down the road.

The White Screen of Death sounds scary but it’s almost always a plugin, theme, or memory issue. Work through the steps above in order and you’ll have your site back in minutes.