WordPress
Make your WordPress site static. No plugin, nothing breaks.
WordPress stays where it is, and you keep writing in it. Your visitors get a static copy that works like your site: page builder layouts, images, fonts, the contact form. Behind it there's no database, no plugin and no login page. All we need is the address. Nothing gets installed, and nobody needs your password.
Your whole site, on your own domain.
Free while we're in beta. No credit card.
Test it on one of your pages
About twenty seconds, no account. You see your page and the copy side by side and click through it yourself.
A copy that works like your site
A plain HTML export saves each page with the files it links to. Anything a page loads only after it opens, like images that appear as you scroll, a menu that fills in, content a script fetches or a link that redirects, often goes missing. And you hear about it from a visitor.
A MakeStatic copy works like your site, it doesn't just look like it. You test it yourself, side by side with your site, before deciding anything. And if a page of the copy ever behaves differently from yours, write to [email protected] and we'll fix it.
- Images that load as you scroll, in every size your site has for phones and big screens.
- Fonts, icons and everything your theme or page builder brings along.
- Content a script loads after the page opens, and menus that fill in on hover.
- Links that redirect to another address still redirect.
- Videos that play and let you skip ahead.
- Contact forms that deliver and a search box that answers.
Why not a plugin?
The usual way to make WordPress static is a plugin that exports your pages as HTML from inside WordPress. You install it, keep it updated and look after wherever the files end up. Then you check the result, because anything a page loads only after it opens is exactly where exported sites break.
And a plugin is no use if an agency manages your install, if your WordPress.com plan doesn't allow plugins, or if nobody has the login anymore. We only need the address, so none of that matters. If the site is online, we can copy it.
What happens to your plugins
They keep working where they work today: in your admin. A page builder, an SEO plugin, a gallery or a slider has done its job by the time the page is finished, so its result is in the copy.
The difference: none of them answers a visitor anymore. An outdated plugin is no longer a way into the site the public sees, and a failed update breaks your editing, not your website.
Contact forms, search and comments
After the first copy of your whole site, you get a list of everything on it that needs something running in the background, with the page it's on. Here's what happens to each:
- Contact forms and newsletter sign-ups, from Contact Form 7, WPForms and the like, reach us when a visitor sends them. We email them to you and list them on your site's page. The form looks exactly as it does now.
- The search box answers from the text of your pages. It searches the words on them rather than using WordPress's own search, and the list tells you so.
- Comments and logins can't be files. We list them for you, but we don't take them over.
- A shop's cart and checkout need WordPress running behind them, so a static copy isn't the way to run a shop.
When you change something
Write and edit in WordPress as always, then publish the copy. Each publish shows which pages were added, changed or removed. So you can see it went through, and you'll spot a page that changed without you.
Your domain and your rankings
Once you're happy with the copy, your domain points at it, and WordPress moves to a second address such as wp.yourcompany.com, where you keep editing.
Search engines then find the same pages at the same addresses: same words, same headings, same links. Nothing they know about your site is lost. Trial copies are never indexed, so they can't compete with your site.
Frequently asked questions
- Do I need to install a plugin?
- No. Nothing gets installed in WordPress, and we never ask for a login. All we need is the address.
- Does it work with Elementor, Divi or the block editor?
- Yes. The page builder has done its work by the time the page is finished, and the copy works like that page, with the builder's styles and scripts. The fastest way to be sure for your site: enter its address and compare the two side by side. If something behaves differently, we fix it.
- Is this the same as a caching plugin?
- No. A cache keeps WordPress answering your visitors, just faster. Here WordPress stops answering visitors altogether: they get files, and WordPress is only there for you to edit in.
- Do I still need a staging site?
- Not for your content. Your WordPress is where you work, and visitors see nothing you change there until you publish. So you try out a change right where you make it. To test a plugin update on a second WordPress first, your host's staging is still the right tool.
- My WordPress has been hacked. Will this fix it?
- Clean it up first. We copy what the site shows, so a copy of a hacked site carries whatever was planted in its pages. Going static stops it from happening again. It doesn't undo it.
Free while we're in beta
MakeStatic is new, and while it's in beta you get all of it for free: your whole site, on your own domain. No credit card, no commitment.
At some point it will cost something. When there's a price, you'll see it before anything about your site changes.