When a site will not load, the first job is not to fix anything but to narrow down the fault. Most cases come down to five causes, and you can check them in order in a few minutes without any access to the server.
Open the site on another device and over a mobile connection, meaning outside your own office wifi. If the site works on a phone on mobile data but not on your computer, the fault is in your own network, the browser cache or the DNS cache, not in the site. Try another browser and clear the browser cache.
The text the browser shows narrows the cause down quickly.
| What you see | What it usually means |
|---|---|
| Site cannot be found or a DNS error | The domain or the name server settings. The site itself may be perfectly fine. |
| Connection timed out | The server does not respond at all. An outage or a firewall. |
| 500 Internal Server Error | The server responds but the site crashes. See our separate guide on the 500 error. |
| A blank white page | PHP stopped halfway through. See the guide on the white screen. |
| Your connection is not private | The SSL certificate has expired or is for the wrong address. |
An expired domain is a surprisingly common cause, because the renewal invoice often goes to someone who no longer works there. Check that it is valid and that the name servers point to the right place. There are instructions in our guide on changing name servers.
If the domain has just been transferred or the name servers were just changed, the change may still be propagating. Give it a few hours before you look for the fault elsewhere.
An expired certificate does not take the site down, but the browser blocks access, which looks the same to a visitor. On Nordweb hosting the certificate renews automatically, but elsewhere it can be manual work. If needed, read about setting up an SSL certificate.
Log in to the control panel. If the panel opens but the site does not, the server is up and the fault is in the site. If the panel does not open either, this is an outage or a wider incident. While you are there, check the disk space. A full disk takes down both the site and the database without any other warning.
Do not start deleting plugins, themes or files on a hunch before you know the cause. Take a backup before you change anything. If the site is already down, a backup is the one thing that guarantees the situation cannot get any worse.
We fix broken sites by the hour. The work covers the diagnosis, a backup, the repair and a report on what was done. We reply the same working day, and a site that is completely down goes into work within twenty four hours.
