Most website owners want to attract visitors to their sites, but in some circumstances, you may want to keep some content private. One way to do this is to unpublish your WordPress content so that it’s hidden from the public.
There are several methods to unpublish your WordPress site and its content. Let’s look at the easiest way to do it, and then we can look at some more advanced methods that will give you control over your WordPress website.
Unpublish Pages & Posts Using WordPress Default Visibility
The easiest way to do this is to switch published posts to either private or draft status. You can quickly “unpublish” your WordPress pages and posts by doing this.
Head to the Pages or Posts section in your WordPress admin dashboard
Next, open your desired post and look for the Publish box in the edit screen. Click Edit next to your post Status.
Now, select the Private or Draft option and click update.
Your WordPress content now becomes inaccessible to the public and viewable only in the backend of your CMS. This is a quick and easy way to unpublish your WordPress posts.
An alternative option that you may want to use if you want the content to still be accessible with password access is to use a password protection plugin like PPWP.
PPWP allows you to create a password for your content manually. If you switch your posts status to Draft Mode, the post will be completely unpublished, and visitors that click through to the page will reach a 404 error.
Hide Pages and Posts Using PPWP Plugin
WordPress default installation gives you minimal control over page visibility on your website. You cannot protect pages and posts by user roles, which is where a password protection plugin comes in handy.
PPWP offers a free solution that enables you to protect your WordPress content with a password form – you’re able to lock content with one or multiple passwords, which can be given out according to user roles.
To get started using our PPWP plugin, you need to first click Add New under Plugin in your WordPress admin dashboard.
Type “password protect wordpress” in the keyword box.
Install and activate the plugin. Once it’s activated, visit the Pages or Posts section and edit your post.
Look for the Password Protect WordPress option.
Select a user role from the Role dropdown list. Enter your password and click submit.
Once you’ve done this, you can go ahead and update the post.
Unpublish WordPress Custom Post Types with PPWP Pro
If you have custom post types such as WooCommerce products, reviews, or demo pages, you may want to give PPWP Pro a try, as it has more advanced features allowing you to make your WordPress site private.
PPWP Pro makes it easy for you to auto-generate new passwords, set expiration times, and manage all these passwords in one place. Here’s how you can get started:
First, download our PPWP Pro plugin, install, and activate it. Then, go to Settings under the Password Protect WordPress section in your admin area and select your post types in the Post Type Protection option – when done, click to save your changes.
Next, open the custom content you plan to protect and click Password protect – you have the option to auto-generate new passwords or create your own new passwords.
PPWP Pro allows you to decide when your passwords become expired, based on either time or usage. The Action column allows you to easily copy, edit, deactivate, or even remove your password.
Secure Your WordPress Content with PPP Plugin
Another option is to use the Protect WordPress Pages, Posts, & Custom Post Types plugin, – while PPWP Pro locks content with passwords, PPP secures the original links. Unauthorized users will be redirected to a 404 not found page when attempting to access the page via their original URLs.
You can then grant users access to these private content by generating individual access links.
To get started with PPP, first install and activate the plugin. Next, click on the Content Protection option on your admin menu and select the post type you intend to protect – “Pages” and “Posts” are added by default.
Then, open the content you want to protect, hit Configure protection, and press Protect this post button.
Now you can select user roles that allows others to access your private content, e.g. admin users only.
You can generate a new unique access link for your content automatically or customize your own one (optional) that you can then send to whomever you want to give access to the content.
How to Unpublish the Entire WordPress Site
When people say they want to unpublish their WordPress site, they may mean that they simply want Google and other search engines to stop indexing it. And, it is possible for you to stop your website from showing up in Google by discouraging search engines from indexing it.
To do this, simply tick the Search Engine Visibility option under your WordPress Reading settings. Your website should no longer appear on search results, though Google may still index your website in some circumstances.
Again, this option is intended to completely remove your website from search engines, so only do this if you’re not looking to get organic traffic from Google.
Unpublishing Your WordPress Site – Conclusion
Hiding a WordPress site is fairly straightforward. If you just want to hide some pages or posts, switch their status to Draft mode in the post edit screen.
If you want to stop specific users from accessing your WordPress content whilst allowing others, PPWP Pro gives you the ability to lock content with passwords, and PPP works to protect the URLs of your pages, posts, and custom post types by giving you the opportunity to give out individual links. Either way, there’s a solution for your issue, whether simple or a little more complex.
