Requirements
What a site needs before WP Octo can look after it, and what WP Octo itself runs on.
The WordPress site
The worker plugin is written to run on ordinary hosting, shared hosting included. It needs:
| Requirement | |
|---|---|
| PHP | 7.4 or later. The plugin is checked against every version from 7.4 to 8.5. |
| WordPress | 5.2 is the declared minimum; 5.9 and later are the versions the plugin is actually booted against. Between the two it should work and has not been checked. |
| Web server | Anything that runs WordPress. Apache and LiteSpeed with .htaccess, or nginx. |
| PHP limits | The worker is designed to work with 30 seconds of execution time and 128 MB of memory. It does its work in short steps that survive a timeout; more headroom makes it faster, not more correct. |
| Outbound HTTPS | The site must be able to reach wpocto.com over HTTPS. This is what every managed site uses to report in, and it is the one connection that keeps working on hosts whose firewall blocks incoming calls from the platform. |
| WP-Cron | The site's own scheduler. Many things the worker does between calls from the platform — continuing a backup, syncing its state — run on WP-Cron, so a site where WP-Cron is disabled and no system cron replaces it does that work only when the platform calls or a visitor arrives. |
WP-CLI, shell access and a database console are not required. The worker never assumes them.
A firewall in front of the site
Hosts that run bot protection (Imunify360, Sucuri, Cloudflare, Wordfence) sometimes refuse the platform's calls to the site. Since worker 2.3.0 the site keeps its data current and takes its work over its own outbound calls in that situation. The hosting compatibility page explains what still needs a person.
The site's address
A site is identified by the address WordPress reports as its home. That address must answer directly: a site that redirects to another address — http:// to https://, without to with www — is refused when it is added, because a redirect strips the credential from the platform's calls and turns a write into a read. Enter the address the site actually answers on, including the path when WordPress lives in a subdirectory.
The workspace
A workspace is created with an account on wpocto.com. The person who creates it is its administrator; further members join by invitation. Plans and subscriptions, where they apply, are managed under workspace settings.
Browsers
The dashboard is built with current web technology and is used in a current version of Chrome, Firefox, Safari or Edge. It works in light and dark mode and on a phone.