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Backing Up WordPress Site
Backing up your WordPress website means making sure that all of your data is kept
safe in an alternative location. In the event of something going wrong with your
WordPress site, a backup is a good way to ensure that all of your files can be restored
to their original condition.
PRO TIP
Backup your website as often as possible in order to avoid any nasty surprises.
Sometimes, when moving, deleting, or editing your WordPress files, you will notice an
error or change on your website that can be very difficult and time-consuming to correct.
That’s why backing up your WordPress website is so important.

Using WordPress Plugin

One of the best methods to backup your WordPress site is to use All-In-One WP
Migration plugin which is pre-installed on 000webhost.
In order to create a backup of your WordPress, click the All-In-One WP
Migration plugin that is visible on the WordPress Admin menu. The
options Export, Import, and Backups will be available. Click Export to proceed to the
Export Site screen, and then select the Export To button. You will then be asked to
choose a location to save your newly exported WordPress files:

 File
 FTP
 DropBox
 Google Drive
 Amazon S3
 OneDrive
 Box

Choose the first option if you want to save backup files to your computer. The only thing
left for you to do is click Download and you’re all done.
From this point on, you’ll be able to Import all of your safeguarded WordPress files and
database onto your new or existing WordPress instance following almost identical
steps. The only difference is, when you have successfully downloaded the All-In-One
WP Migration plugin on your new website, be sure to select Import instead of Export.
With barely any effort at all, you will be able to see all of your themes, images, text,
plugins, widgets, and everything else exactly as you did before.
Using FTP and phpMyAdmin

There are more ways to create backup of your WordPress site. One way to backup your
files in a safe and simple way is through an FTP client, like Filezilla or Cyberduck. This
method is particularly useful if you cannot access your WordPress admin area.
Follow these steps, to backup your WordPress files using FTP:

1. Enable FTP transfer option in 000webhost panel, General settings page.

2. Copy FTP authentication details (host name and username) from the
same General settings page.
3. Open FTP client and connect to 000webhost server using above mentioned
details.
4. Right click on public_html folder and choose Download

Keep in mind that due to the nature of FTP, it can take quite some time to download all
website files.
While WordPress files are download, you can proceed and create a backup of
WordPress database. On 000webhost it’s easy:

 While in 000webhost control panel, click on Manage Databases icon.

 Click on Manage -> phpMyAdmin for appropriate database.
 You will be redirected to phpMyAdmin.
 Click on Export tab.

 Click Go

That’s it! Once all of your WordPress files are downloaded and the download of the SQL
file is complete, you will have a full backup of your WordPress site.
Although FTP backups are considered a more hands on and manual way of backing up
your WordPress site, compared to the All-In-One WP Migration export and import, it is a
relatively easy way of duplicating your WordPress database and files to another
location. In essence, all you have to do is download the files onto FTP client, and your
WordPress site is saved.

Optimizing WordPress Performance

A slow WordPress is a bummer for any website owner. No visitor wants to wait for a
page to take more than 3 seconds to load. Unfortunately, websites powered by
WordPress tend to slow down with time, therefore, it’s important to give a lot of attention
to WordPress performance optimization. In the following part of our WordPress tutorial,
we will talk about the potential causes of slow WordPress website and provide a few
tips on how to optimize WordPress.
  Improperly configured WordPress hosting.
 Minimum or no caching.
 Bad plugins: poorly developed plugins can hurt your website speed
exponentially.
 Overhead caused by external scripts: ads, font loaders etc. can also
sometimes become an efficiency bottleneck.

Using WordPress Caching Plugins

Caching plugins are probably the easiest way to speed up WordPress. With
000webhost WordPress hosting however, you already have most of the work done for
you. Two caching plugins are already installed on your WordPress:

 Page cache plugin. The page caching plugin saves the dynamically
generated HTML files on the server via the cache whenever a request is
received. This reduces the overhead of execution of database queries and the
PHP code.
 Browser cache plugin This plugin reduces the server load by decreasing the
amount of requests received per page. For instance, if you put the right file
headers on static files (images, JavaScript, CSS etc.), the browsers can cache
the files on the computer of the user. By implementing this technique, the
browser will check whether the files have changed since last request and if not, it
will just display cached versions instead of reloading everything from the server .

Although these plugins were created for Hostinger's WordPress hosting, they work
flawlessly on 000webhost. You can find and control these plugins in your
WordPress Admin control panel -> Plugins -> Must-Use section.
PRO TIP
If you have made changes for your WordPress site, but still see the the old version of
the page, it’s possible that caching plugins display cached version instead of a new one.
The very first thing you should do is clear cache. On our Page Cache plugin, it can be
done by pressing the Purge Cache button.
There are other sophisticated plugins that also aid in the overall optimization of a
WordPress website. Ones worth-mentioning are as follows.
W3 total cache
W3 total cache is exactly what its name suggests: a comprehensive caching solution for
WordPress websites. It offers CSS and JS minification, object cache along with the
database cache and page cache abilities.
Minification is the process by which unnecessary characters and blank spaces are
removed from the source code without damaging the functionality.
You can turn on CSS and JavaScript minification in the  General settings section of
W3 Total Cache. To turn on minification simply check Enable box and hit Save all
settings button.
If you need more control, advanced minification settings can be found
on Minify section:

 Combine only does exactly what you think it does: it combines all the CSS
files but doesn’t perform minification.
 Preserved comment removal only removes the comments from the
combined files.
 Line break removal can be checked to remove line breaks present in the
combined files

WP Super Cache
Just like its aforementioned compatriot, the WP Super Cache is also an excellent
caching plugin choice. It can also fulfill all the caching needs of modern websites. After
installation, you can turn caching on by going to  Settings -> WP Super Cache.
Here you can click on the Caching on radio button present in the Easy section, to
turn on the caching or tweak any advanced settings.

1. From Media go to WP Smush.

2. Scroll down and select Settings to tweak configuration according to your
needs. You can smush 50 images at a time.
3. Click on Update Settings and you are ready to go.
4. Hit the Bulk smush button.

Best Practices
Keeping your WordPress website optimized should be an ongoing process; here are a
few best practices to always keep in mind:

 Use Lightweight WordPress theme. Always make use of lightweight

WordPress themes because most of the overloaded themes can make the whole
website slow down.
 Keep WordPress updated. WordPress is updated frequently; make sure that
your website always has the latest version installed .
 Split comments into separate pages. Receiving comments is always a big
yes-yes! But if your post has too many comments then it can become a loading
hazard. A great way to preserve efficiency is by going to Settings ->
Discussion. Here check the Break comments into pages box.
 Remove unused themes and plugins. If you have any unused themes
and plugins installed on your WordPress, remove them. You don’t want that junk
to reside on your hosting account and slow down WordPress .