Working with sites

Everything you do with a site starts in the site list on the left. Select a site to open its page. The page has five tabs: Overview, PHP, Debug, Mail and Database (keys 1 to 5).

The site list

Each row shows the site's preview, its name, its address and its PHP version. It can also show:

Newest sites are at the top. Type in Filter (or press Ctrl+F) to narrow the list by name or PHP version. Esc clears the filter.

Site addresses

Every site has its own address:

http://<name>.127.0.0.1.nip.io:8080

nip.io is a public DNS name that always points to 127.0.0.1, your own PC. You don't need to edit the hosts file or have admin rights. Sites only accept connections from this computer.

8080 is the site port. If another program uses it, change it in Settings. Changing it rewrites every site's URLs to the new port.

Create a site

1. Click New site or press N.
2. Type a Name and click Create.

The address is made from the name: lowercase letters, numbers and hyphens, up to 41 characters. The name as you typed it becomes the WordPress site title. See Getting started for what a new site contains.

Creating a site needs an active trial or license.

The Overview tab

Properties

Actions

Below them, the Mail section lists the latest emails the site sent. See Mail.

Open the site

Click Open site, click the preview, or press O. The site opens in your default browser.

Log in to wp-admin without a password

• Open admin opens a searchable list of the site's users, grouped by role, administrators first. Pick a user (arrow keys and Enter, or click) and your browser opens wp-admin, signed in as that user.
• Enter on a selected site signs you in as its first administrator straight away.
• U opens the user list.

This works for any user on the site, including users restored from a backup, and needs no password. WP Instances adds a small must-use plugin, wpx-autologin.php, and a secret key (WPX_LOGIN_SECRET) to the site's wp-config.php. Each sign-in link is signed with that key and expires after 5 minutes. It's meant for local development only.

Site files

Site files live in a Docker volume, not on your Windows drive. That's what makes creating sites and loading pages fast. You can still reach them:

• Show files (F) opens the site's folder in Windows Explorer, through Docker Desktop's WSL share (a path starting with \\wsl.localhost\docker-desktop\…).
• Open in VS Code (E) opens the same folder in Visual Studio Code. It needs the code command, which VS Code's installer adds to your PATH.

Both open the live site files. Edits show in the browser right away; PHP re-checks changed files every 2 seconds.

You can also install and update plugins and themes from wp-admin as usual. WordPress can write its files directly, without asking for FTP details.

To bring in a large backup file, use Import backup instead of dragging it into the Explorer window. Copying big files into the \\wsl.localhost path can fail with a wrong "not enough space" error; the import copies through Docker and doesn't have that problem.

Duplicate a site

1. Select the site and click Duplicate…, or press D.
2. Change Name of the copy if you like. It starts as <name>-copy.
3. Leave Skip backup archives on to leave out .wpress files and UpdraftPlus sets stored in the site. They are often half a site's size.
4. Click Duplicate.

The copy gets all files and a copy of the database. WP Instances then:

• points wp-config.php at the new database
• rewrites absolute file paths that plugins store, for example in cache or firewall configs
• rewrites the old address to the new one everywhere, including JSON-escaped URLs (GUIDs are left alone, as WordPress advises)
• keeps the PHP version of the original
• gives the copy its own sign-in key

Before copying, it checks there is enough disk space. If anything fails, the partial copy is removed. Duplicating needs an active trial or license.

Delete a site

1. Select the site and click Delete site…, or press Delete.
2. The dialog lists exactly what is removed: the files, the database (all posts, pages, users and settings) and the address.
3. Type the site's name to confirm, then click Delete site.

Deleting can't be undone. To keep a safety copy first, cancel and use Duplicate.

Deleting works with or without a license.

Previews

The picture of each site is a screenshot of its homepage. WP Instances takes it in the background with Microsoft Edge, using its own separate Edge profile; your own Edge, its history and its settings are not touched.

A new preview is taken:

• after you create, import into, duplicate or switch the PHP version of a site
• when you press R or click Refresh preview
• in the background, for previews older than an hour
• when you come back to the WP Instances window and the selected site's preview is more than 2 minutes old

If the homepage answers with a server error, the previous preview is kept. Previews are stored in %APPDATA%\WP Instances\data\thumbs.

Jobs and progress

Creating, importing, duplicating, deleting, switching PHP and changing ports run as jobs. A progress window shows the steps, a progress bar and the time taken. Show Details shows the full log, and opens by itself if the job fails.

• Run in Background hides the window. The job keeps running, shown in the status bar; click it there to see the window again. A notification appears when it finishes.
• Only one job can run on a site at a time. Starting another says Busy and names the job that's still running.

When the sites aren't running

If the Docker stack isn't running, a bar at the top says The Docker stack isn't running, so sites won't load. Make sure Docker Desktop is running. Start Docker Desktop, then click Try again. If the site port is taken by another program, the bar says so and offers Change port…. See FAQ and troubleshooting.