A semantic platform for personal publishing

Before You Begin

Welcome. To me, WordPress is a project unlike any other. Each developer and contributor brings something of their own to it, and together we build something remarkable that I am honored to be part of. Countless hours have been poured into WordPress, and we work to improve it daily. Thank you for bringing it into your world.

— Matt Mullenweg

Installation: The Well-Known Five-Minute Setup

  1. Extract the package into an empty folder and upload all of its contents.
  2. Visit wp-admin/install.php in your browser. It will walk you through creating a wp-config.php file that holds your database connection details.
    1. Should that fail for any reason, don't worry. Some web hosts may not support it. Open wp-config-sample.php in a text editor such as WordPad or similar and enter your database connection details.
    2. Save it as wp-config.php and upload the file.
    3. Open wp-admin/install.php in your browser.
  3. With the configuration file in place, the installer will create the database tables your site needs. If an error appears, recheck your wp-config.php file and retry. If it still fails, head to the WordPress support forums with as much detail as you can collect.
  4. If you skipped entering a password, write down the one you were given. If you left the username blank, it will be admin.
  5. The installer will then take you to the login page. Log in using the username and password you set during installation. If a password was generated for you, click “Profile” afterward to change it.

Keeping WordPress Up to Date

With the Automatic Updater

  1. Go to wp-admin/update-core.php in your browser and follow the on-screen steps.
  2. Expecting something more involved? That's all there is to it!

Updating by Hand

  1. Before updating anything, be sure you have backups of any files you have changed, such as index.php.
  2. Remove your old WordPress files, keeping any you have customized.
  3. Upload the fresh files.
  4. Direct your browser to /wp-admin/upgrade.php.

Moving Over from Other Platforms

WordPress can bring in content from many other systems. You will first need WordPress installed and running as described above before you use our import tools.

What Your Server Needs

Suggested Setup

Resources on the Web

If this document leaves any of your questions unanswered, make use of the many online resources WordPress offers:

HelpHub
HelpHub serves as the encyclopedia for everything WordPress. It is the most thorough information source for WordPress you will find.
The WordPress Blog
Here you will find the newest updates and news about WordPress. By default, recent WordPress news shows up in your admin dashboard.
WordPress Planet
WordPress Planet is a news aggregator that gathers posts from WordPress blogs across the web.
WordPress Support Forums
If you have searched everywhere and still have no answer, the support forums are lively and full of people ready to assist. To make helping you easier, use a clear thread title and explain your question in as much detail as you can.
WordPress IRC (Internet Relay Chat) Channel
An online chat channel exists where WordPress users talk things over and sometimes offer support. The wiki page above should guide you there. (irc.libera.chat #wordpress)

A Few Last Notes

Pass It Along

WordPress has no multi-million dollar marketing campaign or celebrity sponsors, but we have something better—you. If you enjoy WordPress, consider telling a friend about it, setting it up for someone less familiar with it than you, or writing to the author of a media article that overlooks us.

WordPress is the official successor to b2/cafélog, originally created by Michel V. Its development has been carried on by the WordPress developers. If you would like to support WordPress, please consider donating.

Licensing

WordPress is free software, distributed under the terms of the GPL (GNU General Public License) version 2 or, at your choice, any later version. See license.txt.