The dreaded 500 internal server error. It always seems to come at the most inopportune time and yous're suddenly left scrambling to effigy out how to get your WordPress site back online. Trust united states of america, we've all been at that place. Other errors that behave similarly that you might take as well seen include the frightening error establishing a database connectedness and the dreaded white screen of decease. But from the moment your site goes down, you're losing visitors and customers. Not to mention it simply looks bad for your make.

Today we're going to dive into the 500 internal server mistake and walk you through some ways to become your site dorsum online quickly. Read more than below about what causes this fault and what yous can exercise to prevent it in the time to come.

  • What is a 500 internal server fault?
  • How to fix the 500 internal server error

Cheque Out Our Ultimate Guide to Fixing the 500 Internal Server Mistake

What is a 500 Internal Server Error?

The Internet Engineering Chore Force (IETF) defines the 500 Internal Server Error as:

The 500 (Internal Server Mistake) status code indicates that the server encountered an unexpected condition that prevented it from fulfilling the request.

When you visit a website your browser sends a asking over to the server where the site is hosted. The server takes this request, processes information technology, and sends back the requested resources (PHP, HTML, CSS, etc.) along with an HTTP header. The HTTP also includes what they call an HTTP status code. A condition lawmaking is a fashion to notify you nearly the status of the request. Information technology could be a 200 status lawmaking which means "Everything is OK" or a 500 status code which means something has gone wrong.

There are a lot of different types of 500 status mistake codes (500, 501, 502, 503, 504, etc.) and they all hateful something different. In this instance, a 500 internal server error indicates that the server encountered an unexpected condition that prevented information technology from fulfilling the request(RFC 7231, section 6.6.i).

500 internal server error in WordPress
500 internal server error in WordPress

500 Internal Server Error Variations

Due to the various spider web servers, operating systems, and browsers, a 500 internal server error tin present itself in a number of different means. But they are all communicating the same affair. Below are just a couple of the many different variations you might run into on the spider web:

    • "500 Internal Server Error"
    • "HTTP 500"
    • "Internal Server Mistake"
    • "HTTP 500 – Internal Server Mistake"
    • "500 Error"
    • "HTTP Mistake 500"
    • "500 – Internal Server Error"
    • "500 Internal Server Error. Sorry something went wrong."
    • "500. That'southward an error. There was an error. Please try again later. That's all we know."
    • "The website cannot display the folio – HTTP 500."
    • "Is currently unable to handle this request. HTTP ERROR 500."

You might likewise see this message accompanying it:

The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request. Please contact the server administrator, [electronic mail protected] and inform them of the fourth dimension the fault occurred, and anything yous might have washed that may accept caused the error. More data most this error may be available in the server error log.

Internal Server Error
Internal Server Error

Other times, you might merely see a blank white screen. When dealing with 500 internal server errors, this is actually quite common in browsers similar Firefox and Safari.

500 internal server error in Firefox
500 internal server mistake in Firefox

Bigger brands might even take their own custom 500 internal server mistake messages, such as this one from Airbnb.

Airbnb 500 internal server error
Airbnb 500 internal server mistake

Here is another creative 500 server fault example from the folks over at readme.

readme 500 internal server error
readme 500 internal server error

Even the mighty YouTube isn't safe from 500 internal server errors.

500 internal server error on YouTube
500 internal server error on YouTube

If it'southward an IIS 7.0 (Windows) or higher server, they have additional HTTP status codes to more closely indicate the cause of the 500 error:

  • 500.0 – Module or ISAPI mistake occurred.
  • 500.xi – Application is shutting down on the web server.
  • 500.12 – Application is decorated restarting on the spider web server.
  • 500.13 – Web server is as well busy.
  • 500.15 – Direct requests for global.asax are non allowed.
  • 500.xix – Configuration information is invalid.
  • 500.21 – Module not recognized.
  • 500.22 – An ASP.Net httpModules configuration does not utilize in Managed Pipeline mode.
  • 500.23 – An ASP.NET httpHandlers configuration does non apply in Managed Pipeline manner.
  • 500.24 – An ASP.NET impersonation configuration does not apply in Managed Pipeline manner.
  • 500.fifty – A rewrite error occurred during RQ_BEGIN_REQUEST notification handling. A configuration or entering rule execution error occurred.
  • 500.51 – A rewrite error occurred during GL_PRE_BEGIN_REQUEST notification handling. A global configuration or global dominion execution error occurred.
  • 500.52 – A rewrite mistake occurred during RQ_SEND_RESPONSE notification handling. An outbound rule execution occurred.
  • 500.53 – A rewrite mistake occurred during RQ_RELEASE_REQUEST_STATE notification handling. An outbound rule execution error occurred. The rule is configured to exist executed earlier the output user cache gets updated.
    500.100 – Internal ASP error.

500 Errors Impact on SEO

Unlike 503 errors, which are used for WordPress maintenance mode and tell Google to check back at a afterwards time, a 500 error tin have a negative impact on SEO if not fixed right away. If your site is only downward for say 10 minutes and it's beingness crawled consistently a lot of times the crawler will but get the page delivered from cache. Or Google might not even accept a take chances to re-clamber it before it's support. In this scenario, you lot're completely fine.

However, if the site is down for an extended period of fourth dimension, say half-dozen+ hours, then Google might see the 500 error as a site level consequence that needs to be addressed. This could impact your rankings. If you're worried about repeat 500 errors yous should figure out why they are happening to begin with. Some of the solutions beneath can help.

How to Fix the 500 Internal Server Error

Where should you start troubleshooting when you see a 500 internal server fault on your WordPress site? Sometimes you might not even know where to begin. Typically 500 errors are on the server itself, merely from our experience, these errors originate from 2 things, the first isuser mistake (client-side upshot), and the second is that there is a problem with the server. So we'll dive into a little of both.

Bank check out these common causes and ways to set up the 500 internal server error and get dorsum upwardly and running in no time.

one. Endeavour Reloading the Page

This might seem a little obvious to some, simply i of the easiest and commencement things you should try when encountering a 500 internal server error is to simply await a minute or and so and reload the page (F5 or Ctrl + F5). It could be that the host or server is merely overloaded and the site will come correct dorsum. While you lot're waiting, you could likewise rapidly try a different browser to rule that out as an effect.

Another matter you lot can do is to paste the website into downforeveryoneorjustme.com. This website volition tell you if the site is down or if it's a problem on your side. A tool like this checks the HTTP status code that is returned from the server. If it's anything other than a 200 "Everything is OK" and then it will return a downwardly indication.

downforeveryoneorjustme
downforeveryoneorjustme

We've also noticed that sometimes this can occur immediately after you update a plugin or theme on your WordPress site. Typically this is on hosts that aren't set up properly. What happens is they experience a temporary timeout right afterward. However, things usually resolve themselves in a couple of seconds and therefore refreshing is all you need to do.

ii. Clear Your Browser Enshroud

Clearing your browser cache is always another good troubleshooting stride before diving into deeper debugging on your site. Below are instructions on how to clear cache in the various browsers:

  • How to Forcefulness Refresh a Single Folio for All Browsers
  • How to Clear Browser Enshroud for Google Chrome
  • How to Clear Browser Enshroud for Mozilla Firefox
  • How to Clear Browser Cache for Safari
  • How to Clear Browser Cache for Net Explorer
  • How to Articulate Browser Enshroud for Microsoft Border
  • How to Clear Browser Cache for Opera

3. Check Your Server Logs

You should as well take advantage of your fault logs. If you're a Kinsta customer, you tin easily see errors in the log viewer in the MyKinsta dashboard. This tin can help you quickly narrow down the issue, especially if it's resulting from a plugin on your site.

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Check error logs for 500 internal server errors
Check error logs for 500 internal server errors

If your host doesn't accept a logging tool, you can also enable WordPress debugging mode by adding the following code to your wp-config.php file to enable logging:

          define( 'WP_DEBUG', truthful ); define( 'WP_DEBUG_LOG', true ); ascertain( 'WP_DEBUG_DISPLAY', false );

The logs are typically located in the /wp-content directory. Others, like hither at Kinsta might have a defended folder called "logs".

WordPress error logs folder (SFTP)
WordPress error logs binder (SFTP)

You can likewise bank check the log files in Apache and Nginx, which are commonly located hither:

  • Apache: /var/log/apache2/error.log
  • Nginx: /var/log/nginx/error.log

If you're a Kinsta client you can also take reward of our analytics tool to go a breakdown of the total number of 500 errors and see how often and when they are occurring. This tin can aid y'all troubleshoot if this is an ongoing upshot, or mayhap something that has resolved itself.

Response analysis 500 error breakdown
Response assay 500 fault breakdown

If the 500 error is displaying considering of a fatal PHP error, y'all tin can also endeavor enabling PHP error reporting. Simply add the post-obit code to the file throwing the error. Typically you can narrow downwardly the file in the console tab of Google Chrome DevTools.

          ini_set('display_errors', 1); ini_set('display_startup_errors', i); error_reporting(E_ALL);

And you lot might demand to also modify your php.ini file with the following:

          display_errors = on

4. Fault Establishing a Database Connection

500 internal server errors can also occur from a database connectedness error. Depending upon your browser you might see different errors. Merely both will generate a 500 HTTP condition code regardless in your server logs.

Below is an example of what an "fault establishing a database connectedness" bulletin looks like your browser. The entire folio is blank considering no data can be retrieved to render the page, as the connectedness is not working properly. Not only does this suspension the front-end of your site, merely it will also forbid you lot from accessing your WordPress dashboard.

Example of error establishing a database connection
Case of error establishing a database connection

And so why exactly does this happen? Well, here are a few common reasons below.

  • The most mutual issue is that yourdatabase login credentials are incorrect. Your WordPress site uses separate login data to connect to its MySQL database.
  • Your WordPress database is corrupted. With so many moving parts with themes, plugins, and users constantly deleting and installing them, sometimes databases get corrupted. This can exist due to a missing or individually corrupted tabular array, or perhaps some information was deleted by accident.
  • Y'all may have decadent files in your WordPress installation. This can even happen sometimes due to hackers.
  • Bug with your database server. A number of things could be wrong on the spider web hosts end, such as the database being overloaded from a traffic spike or unresponsive from too many concurrent connections. This is actually quite common with shared hosts every bit they are utilizing the aforementioned resource for a lot of users on the same servers.

Cheque out our in-depth postal service on how to fix the mistake establishing a database connectedness in WordPress.

5. Check Your Plugins and Themes

Tertiary-party plugins and themes can hands crusade 500 internal server errors. Nosotros've seen all types cause them here at Kinsta, from slider plugins to ad rotator plugins. A lot of times you should meet the mistake immediately later installing something new or running an update. This is i reason why nosotros ever recommend utilizing a staging environment for updates or at least running updates one by one. Otherwise, if y'all encounter a 500 internal server error you're of a sudden scrambling to figure out which one acquired it.

A few ways you tin troubleshoot this is past deactivating all your plugins. Remember, you won't lose whatever information if you merely conciliate a plugin. If you lot can notwithstanding access your admin, a quick style to practise this is to browse to "Plugins" and select "Deactivate" from the bulk actions carte du jour. This volition disable all of your plugins.

Deactivate all plugins
Deactivate all plugins

If this fixes the issue you'll need to find the culprit. Start activating them one by i, reloading the site after each activation. When you come across the 500 internal server error render, you've found the misbehaving plugin. You tin can then reach out to the plugin programmer for help or mail a support ticket in the WordPress repository.

If you tin't login to WordPress admin you tin FTP into your server and rename your plugins binder to something similar plugins_old. Then check your site again. If it works, so you will need to examination each plugin one by one. Rename your plugin folder back to "plugins" and and so rename each plugin folder inside of if it, one by one, until you find it. You lot could besides try to replicate this on a staging site outset.

Rename plugin folder
Rename plugin folder

E'er makes sure your plugins, themes, and WordPress cadre are up to engagement. And check to ensure y'all are running a supported version of PHP. If it turns out to exist a disharmonize with bad code in a plugin, yous might need to bring in a WordPress developer to fix the upshot.

vi. Reinstall WordPress Core

Sometimes WordPress cadre files can get corrupted, especially on older sites. Information technology'south actually quite easy to re-upload just the cadre of WordPress without impacting your plugins or themes. We have an in-depth guide with 5 different ways to reinstall WordPress. And of course, make sure to take a backup before proceeding. Skip to one of the sections below:

  • How to reinstall WordPress from the WordPress dashboard while preserving existing content
  • How to manually reinstall WordPress via FTP while preserving existing content
  • How to manually reinstall WordPress via WP-CLI while preserving existing content

7. Permissions Error

A permissions fault with a file or folder on your server can also crusade a 500 internal server error to occur. Here are some typical recommendations for permissions when it comes to file and binder permissions in WordPress:

  • All files should be 644 (-rw-r–r–) or 640.
  • All directories should exist 755 (drwxr-xr-x) or 750.
  • No directories should ever be given 777, even upload directories.
  • Hardening: wp-config.php could also be fix to 440 or 400 to prevent other users on the server from reading it.

Meet the WordPress Codex commodity on irresolute file permissions for a more in-depth explanation.

You can hands encounter your file permissions with an FTP client (as seen beneath). Y'all could also reach out to your WordPress host support squad and ask them to quickly GREP file permissions on your folders and files to ensure they're setup properly.

File permissions SFTP
File permissions SFTP

8. PHP Memory Limit

A 500 internal server error could also be caused by exhausting the PHP retention limit on your server. You could try increasing the limit. Follow the instructions below on how to change this limit in cPanel, Apache, your php.ini file, and wp-config.php file.

Increase PHP Memory Limit in cPanel

If you're running on a host that uses cPanel, you lot can easily change this from the UI. Nether Software click on "Select PHP Version."

Select PHP version
Select PHP version

Click on "Switch to PHP Options."

Switch to PHP options
Switch to PHP options

You can so click on the memory_limit attribute and modify its value. And then click on "Save."

Increase PHP memory limit in cPanel
Increase PHP memory limit in cPanel

Increment PHP Memory Limit in Apache

The .htaccess file is a special hidden file that contains various settings y'all tin employ to alter the server behavior, right down to a directory specific level. Commencement login to your site via FTP or SSH, take a look at your root directory and see if there is a .htaccess file at that place.

.htaccess file
.htaccess file

If at that place is you can edit that file to add the necessary lawmaking for increasing the PHP memory limit. Most likely information technology is set up at 64M or below, you can attempt increasing this value.

          php_value memory_limit 128M

Increase PHP Memory Limit in php.ini File

If the above doesn't work for you might try editing your php.ini file. Log in to your site via FTP or SSH, become to your site's root directory and open or create a php.ini file.

php.ini file
php.ini file

If the file was already there, search for the 3 settings and modify them if necessary. If y'all simply created the file, or the settings are nowhere to be found yous tin can paste the code below. You can change of course the values to meet your needs.

          memory_limit = 128M

Some shared hosts might as well require that you add the suPHP directive in your .htaccess file for the above php.ini file settings to piece of work. To exercise this, edit your .htaccess file, besides located at the root of your site, and add the following code towards the summit of the file:

          <IfModule mod_suphp.c>  suPHP_ConfigPath /abode/yourusername/public_html </IfModule>

If the in a higher place didn't piece of work for you, it could exist that your host has the global settings locked down and instead have it configured to utilize .user.ini files. To edit your .user.ini file, login to your site via FTP or SSH, go to your site'due south root directory and open or create a .user.ini file. Yous can and then paste in the following code:

          memory_limit = 128M

Increase PHP Retentiveness Limit in wp-config.php

The terminal selection is non one we are fans of, only if all else fails you tin give it a go. First, log in to your site via FTP or SSH, and locate your wp-config.php file, which is typically in the root of your site.

wp-config.php file
wp-config.php file

Add the post-obit code to the top of your wp-config.php file:

          ascertain('WP_MEMORY_LIMIT', '128M');

You can besides enquire your host if yous're running into memory limit issues. We utilize New Relic and other troubleshooting methods here at Kinsta to help clients narrow down what plugin, query, or script might be exhausting the limit. You can also use your own custom New Relic cardinal.

Debugging with New Relic
Debugging with New Relic

9. Problem With Your .htaccess File

Kinsta only uses Nginx, but if you're using a WordPress host that is running Apache, it could very well be that your .htaccess file has a trouble or has become corrupted. Follow the steps below to recreate a new one from scratch.

Commencement, log in to your site via FTP or SSH, and rename your .htaccess file to .htaccess_old.

Rename .htaccess file
Rename .htaccess file

Unremarkably to recreate this file you tin can only re-save your permalinks in WordPress. However, if you're in the middle of a 500 internal server fault yous most probable can't access your WordPress admin, so this isn't an option. Therefore y'all can create a new .htaccess file and input the following contents. And then upload information technology to your server.

          # Begin WordPress <IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteBase / RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L] RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteRule . /index.php [L] </IfModule> # END WordPress

See the WordPress Codex for more examples, such every bit a default .htaccess file for multisite.

ten. Coding or Syntax Errors in Your CGI/Perl Script

500 errors being caused by errors in CGI and Perl is a lot less common than it used to exist. Although it'south nonetheless worth mentioning, especially for those using cPanel where there are a lot of one-click CGI scripts still being used. As AEM on Stack Overflow says:

CGI has been replaced by a vast variety of web programming technologies, including PHP, various Apache extensions like mod_perl, Java of various flavors and frameworks including Java EE, Struts, Spring, etc, Python-based frameworks like Django, Ruby on Rails and many other Ruby frameworks, and various Microsoft technologies.

Here are a few tips when working with CGI scripts:

  • When editing, always used a plainly text editor, such as Atom, Sublime, or Notepad++. This ensures they remain in ASCII format.
  • Ensure correct permissions of chmod 755 are used on CGI scripts and directories.
  • Upload your CGI scripts in ASCII mode (which yous can select in your FTP editor) into the cgi-bin directory on your server.
  • Ostend that the Perl modules you crave for your script are installed and supported.

11. Server Upshot (Cheque With Your Host)

Finally, because 500 internal server errors tin too occur from PHP timing out or fatal PHP errors with third-party plugins, you lot can always cheque with your WordPress host. Sometimes these errors can exist hard to troubleshoot without an expert. Here are simply a few common examples of some errors that trigger 500 HTTP status codes on the server that might have yous scratching your caput.

          PHP bulletin: PHP Fatal fault: Uncaught Error: Call to undefined office mysql_error()...        
          PHP bulletin: PHP Fatal fault: Uncaught Mistake: Cannot use object of type WP_Error as assortment in /www/folder/web/shared/content/plugins/plugin/functions.php:525

We monitor all client's sites here at Kinsta and are automatically notified when these types of errors occur. This allows us to exist pro-agile and start fixing the consequence right away. We also utilise LXD managed hosts and orchestrated LXC software containers for each site. This means that every WordPress site is housed in its own isolated container, which has all of the software resource required to run information technology (Linux, Nginx, PHP, MySQL). The resource are 100% private and are not shared with anyone else or fifty-fifty your own sites.

PHP timeouts could also occur from the lack of PHP workers, although typically these cause 504 errors, not 500 errors. These determine how many simultaneous requests your site tin can handle at a given fourth dimension. To put it simply, each uncached request for your website is handled by a PHP Worker.

When PHP workers are already busy on a site, they showtime to build up a queue. One time you lot've reached your limit of PHP workers, the queue starts to push out older requests which could effect in 500 errors or incomplete requests. Read our in-depth article most PHP workers.

Monitor Your Site

If yous're worried about these types of errors happening on your site in the hereafter, you can besides utilize a tool similar updown.io to monitor and notify you immediately if they occur. It periodically sends an HTTP HEAD asking to the URL of your choice. You can simply utilise your homepage. The tool allows y'all to set check frequencies of:

  • xv seconds
  • 30 seconds
  • 1 minute
  • 2 minutes
  • 5 minutes
  • 10 minutes

It will send you lot an electronic mail if and when your site goes downward. Here is an case below.

Email notification of 500 error
Electronic mail notification of 500 error

This can be particularly useful if you're trying to debug a faulty plugin or are on a shared host, who tend to overcrowd their servers. This can give you proof of how often your site might actually be doing downwards (even during the middle of the night). That'southward why we ever recommend going with a managed WordPress host. Make sure to check out our post that explores the summit 9 reasons to cull managed WordPress hosting.

Summary

500 internal server errors are always frustrating, only hopefully, now you know a few additional means to troubleshoot them to apace get your site support and running. Think, typically these types of errors are caused past 3rd-party plugins, fatal PHP errors, database connection issues, problems with your .htaccess file or PHP retention limits, and sometimes PHP timeouts.

Was at that place anything nosotros missed? Perhaps y'all have another tip on troubleshooting 500 internal server errors. If so, permit us know below in the comments.

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