These plugins hide your site during development or maintenance.
Force Login ★
Force Login can be a great way to hide a site before it’s ready. Unlike other “coming soon” plugins, it doesn’t give you a landing page. It just presents the WordPress login form. I like the simplicity of that. I’ve used other “coming soon” plugins only to have the client have to ask me how to log in.
Minimal Coming Soon & Maintenance Mode ★
Puts put an “under construction”, “coming soon” or any message you want as your front page while you’re working on your site. Log in to bypass it. To reduce toolbar clutter, go to the Advanced settings page and check “Disable Maintenance Mode Toolbar Menu”. Requires the paid pro version to change to a custom background image.
Password Protected
If you prefer hiding the site behind a simple password (rather than requiring WP login), check out Password Protected. Note, this doesn’t seem to work on sites with caching (tried on Cloudways with Breeze) due to cookie caching. Instead, I had to use the server’s Basic Authentication.
Please leave a comment or question below! – Brian
I am a freelance web developer and consultant based in Santa Monica, CA. I’ve been designing websites using WordPress and from scratch using HTML, CSS, PHP, and JavaScript since 2010. I create websites and web applications for businesses, nonprofits, and other organizations. I have a degree in Electrical Engineering (BSEE) from California Institute of Technology and a degree in Engineering Management (MSEM) from Stanford University.
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