5 Best WordPress Caching Plugins to Speed Up Your Website (2018)

Are you looking for the best WordPress caching plugins? Caching helps you speed up your WordPress site and boost performance. In this guide, we will share the best WordPress caching plugins for your site.

What is Cache?

Cache is a collection of temporarily stored data for quick access upon request. In computers, information is usually stored on hard disk. When it is requested, a computer needs to run several processes before the information can be presented.

Caching solves this issue by processing the frequently requested information and then storing it in a temporary storage or memory. This allows computers to access it the file quickly.

The same caching concept can also be used by WordPress websites to improve performance and make your website load faster.

You see, WordPress is a dynamic content management system. This means that each time a user visits your website, WordPress fetches information from the database and then runs several other steps before the web page is sent to the user’s browser. For details, see our article on how WordPress actually works.

This makes your website load slower when a lot of users are visiting it at the same time.

Caching allows your WordPress site to skip a lot of steps. Instead of going through the whole page generation process every time, your caching plugin makes a copy of the page after the first load, and then serves that cached version to every subsequent user.

Why is Caching Important

Caching is important because it reduces the load on your WordPress hosting servers and makes your website run faster. You need proper caching set up to improve your WordPress speed and performance.

A faster website improves user experience and encourages users to visit more pages. This also helps you boost engagement and the time users spend on your website.

A faster website helps you drive even more traffic to your website from organic search. Google gives a significant SEO advantage to faster websites which helps you rank higher in search results.

That being said, let’s take a look at the best WordPress caching plugins that you can use to boost your website speed.

1. WP Rocket

WP Rocket is the best WordPress caching plugin in the market. It is the easiest and most beginner-friendly caching plugin, which is a big help if you don’t know the technical terms used for different caching options.

It allows users to instantly cache their website with one-click. It’s crawler automatically fetches your WordPress pages to build up the cache. The plugin then automatically turns on recommended WordPress caching settings like gzip compression, page cache, and cache pre-loading.

WP Rocket also includes optional features that you can turn on to further improve performance. This includes lazy loading images, CDN support, DNS pre-fetching, minification, and more.

2. W3 Total Cache

W3 Total Cache is one of the most popular WordPress caching plugins. It is a comprehensive WordPress caching plugin with a ton of options which may make it appear a bit intimidating for beginners.

It includes all the features you will need to properly set up WordPress cache. This includes page cache, object cache, gzip compression, limited minification support, CDN support, and more.

Beginners may find W3 Total Cache a bit difficult to use. For detailed setup instructions, see our article on how to install and set up W3 Total Cache plugin.

3. WP Super Cache

WP Super Cache is another popular WordPress caching plugin. It is free and comes highly recommended by many of the top WordPress hosting companies.

WP Super Cache plugin includes all recommended caching features that you will need to speed up your website. This includes gzip compression, page cache, cache pre-loading, CDN support, advanced cache preload, and more.

It includes a comprehensive settings section with a separate tab for easy setup. For detailed instructions, see our article on how to install and set up WP Super Cache plugin.

4. Sucuri Firewall

Sucuri is the best WordPress firewall and security plugin. As a website firewall, Sucuri comes with a built-in option to cache your website content and enable gzip compression with a click of the button.

It is the best option for any website because Sucuri is a DNS level firewall. This means that they can serve cached content to your users even before their request reaches your website. This gives your website an incredible performance boost.

5. Built-in Cache Plugins from Hosting

Caching helps significantly reduce the load on hosting servers allowing them to perform optimally. This is why many managed WordPress hosting companies now offer their own built-in caching solutions.

If your website is hosted with one of the following hosting companies, then you can use their built-in caching plugins for your websites.

SG SuperCacher

SiteGround offers a built-in caching solution with all their hosting plans. It can be enabled by from your hosting account’s cPanel dashboard.

Once enabled, you can install and activate the SG Optimizer plugin to manage SuperCacher settings directly from your WordPress admin area.

WP Engine Caching

WP Engine is one of the best managed WordPress hosting companies. Their hosting plans come with built-in caching and performance optimization.

You can manage settings and clear cache from your WordPress admin dashboard. Simply click on the WP Engine menu and under the General settings tab you can manage WP Engine cache settings.

For more advanced caching options, you can install and activate WP Engine Advanced Cache plugin. The plugin provides you some additional controls to manage WP Engine cache settings for your website.

Bluehost Caching

Bluehost is one of the biggest hosting companies in the world and an officially recommended WordPress hosting provider. Their hosting plans include built-in caching that you can enable from your hosting dashboard.

After logging into your hosting account, select your site from ‘My Sites’ page and then click on the performance tab. From here you can turn the cache on / off and change other advanced caching settings.

We hope this article helped you find the WordPress caching plugin to speed up your website. You may also want to see our list of best WordPress plugins for business websites.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

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How to Show Before and After Photo in WordPress (with Slide Effect)

Do you want to show the before and after photos on your website? A before and after photo can be useful to display side by side comparison of two identical images with minor differences. In this article, we will share how to easily show before and after photo in WordPress.

How Does the Before and After Photo Effect Work?

Normally people use Photoshop to create a before and after image. It’s a single photo that shows before / after effects, and you can add it as a static image on your WordPress website.

A functional photo slider is an interactive way to show 2 different versions of a similar image in full size. You can move the slider handle to compare both images side by side.

Let’s take a look on how to easily show before and after photo in WordPress.

Showing the Before and After Photo in WordPress

First thing you need to do is to install and activate the Twenty20 Image Before-After plugin. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you need to create or edit a page/post in your WordPress admin area where you want to show the before and after image. Now, click on the Add Twenty20 button above the text editor.

It’ll open the WordPress Media Library in a popup. From here, you need to select two images for the before and after slider.

Once the images are selected, click on the Insert button.

Next, it’ll display the text fields to add content on top of the before and after photos. You can also add width for the slider, offset value, slider direction, and more.

After that, click on the Insert Shortcode button to add the before and after photo in your WordPress page.

You can also use the Twenty20 image widget to display the before and after photo in your WordPress sidebar. Simply go to Appearance » Widgets section in your WordPress admin, and then drag the Twenty20 Slider widget in your Sidebar widget area.

The Twenty20 Slider widget has similar settings for the before and after photo as we shared above in this guide. You can select the 2 images one by one in the widget settings to create the before and after photo slider.

Now, you can visit your website to see the before and after photo in action.

As the users slide the handle towards each image, the other image will become visible. Users can take the slider all the way to the right or the left to see the full before and after image. As the users slide the before and after labels will automatically disappear.

This plugin works great with the popular WordPress page builders like Beaver Builder and Elementor to quickly show before and after photo in your website pages without using shortcodes.

We hope this article helped you learn how to show before and after photo in WordPress. You may also want to see our guide on how to add magnifying zoom for images in WordPress.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

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How to Add a Mortgage Calculator in WordPress (Step by Step)

Recently one of our readers asked about adding a mortgage calculator in WordPress. A mortgage calculator is a useful tool for real estate websites because it allows visitors to see if they can afford the property they’re looking at. In this article, we will show you how to easily add a mortgage calculator in WordPress.

What is a Mortgage Calculator?

A mortgage calculator is an automated tool that allows you to get estimates for your mortgage payment, with interest rate and amortization period. It allows users to quickly calculate property-related costs on your website.

Who Needs a Mortgage Calculator on their Website?

A mortgage calculator is perfect for real-estate websites that showcase IDX based property listings.

A mortgage calculator allows users to easily calculate the mortgage value of the property, so they can decide if it is within their budget or not.

That being said, let’s take a look on how to easily add a mortgage calculator in WordPress.

Adding a Mortgage Calculator in WordPress

First thing you need to do is to install and activate the Responsive Mortgage Calculator plugin. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you need to visit Settings » Resp Mortgage Calculator page to configure the settings of your mortgage calculator.

On this page, you can start with adding the default values to display in the mortgage calculator fields that’ll help users understand the calculator’s functionality. You can also leave these fields blank, so the users can enter their own values to calculate the cost of a property.

After that, you need to scroll down to the Calculator Settings section where you can change the basic functionalities of your mortgage calculator. Few of these settings include interest rate periods, currency symbol, currency code, formats, enabling down payment feature, and more.

Next, you can scroll down to manage the payment period settings. These settings allow users to calculate the down payments on periodical basis (annual, semi-annual, quarterly, monthly, etc).

You can also set a fixed payment period for the specific property calculations, and it will hide other payment period options.

After the payment settings, you can scroll down to the layout and styling options. From here, you can select a theme for your mortgage calculator, add styling, enable/disable responsive setting, and more.

After that, you can manage how you want to display the results and add labels for the calculator fields.

You can also create your own custom style settings to change the display of your mortgage calculator.

Don’t forget to click on the Save Changes button to properly store these settings.

Upon saving, you’ll see a shortcode on the top of this page. You can copy / paste this shortcode on any post / page where you want to add the mortgage calculator.

If you want to add a mortgage calculator in the sidebar of your website, then go to Appearance » Widgets page and drag the Responsive Mortgage Calculator widget to your sidebar widget area.

After that, you can visit your website to see the mortgage calculator in action.

We hope this article helped you learn how to add a mortgage calculator in WordPress. You may also want to see our list of the best WordPress real estate plugins to add more flexible features on your real estate website.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

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How to Set up WP Mail SMTP with Any Host (Ultimate Guide)

Do you want to set up WP Mail SMTP on your WordPress site? WP Mail SMTP is the best WordPress SMTP plugin which allows you to easily send WordPress emails using a secure mail transfer protocol or SMTP. In this article, we will show you how to easily set up WP Mail SMTP with any host.

What is WP Mail SMTP? Why You Need it to Send WordPress Emails?

WP Mail SMTP is a WordPress plugin which allows you to send WordPress emails using an SMTP server. This ensures that your WordPress emails are delivered using the standard mail protocol.

Once you setup your WordPress site, you may notice that you are not getting any emails from WordPress. This includes WordPress notification emails and emails from your WordPress contact form plugin.

The reason for this is WordPress uses PHP mail() function to send emails. Most WordPress hosting companies do not configure it properly, and some simply disable it to prevent abuse.

The easiest fix for this issue is to use SMTP to send WordPress emails.

SMTP is the secure mail transfer protocol, and it is pretty much the standard way to send emails. It requires you to login to a mail server to send emails which prevents the abuse of the hosting server and improves email deliverability.

Most WordPress hosting companies offer free business email addresses which you can use with your own domain name. We recommend setting up a separate email address for your WordPress website. It can be anything like support@example.com or info@example.com.

Once you have created the email address, you can use it to send WordPress emails. You will still need to tell WordPress how to connect with your mail server.

This is where WP Mail SMTP plugin comes in. It allows you to send WordPress emails via SMTP by entering your SMTP credentials.

WP Mail SMTP is the most popular SMTP solution for WordPress (currently used by over 1 million websites). It’s maintained by the same team as WPForms.

The first thing you need to do is install and activate the WP Mail SMTP plugin. For more details, see our step by step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you need to visit Settings » WP Mail SMTP page to configure the plugin settings.

You need to enter your SMTP settings to use WP Mail SMTP. The first part of the settings will be similar regardless of your hosting company. It includes the following settings:

• From Email – This is the email address which will be used to send all WordPress emails.
• From Name – This name will be used to send emails. We recommend using your website’s title as from name.
• Mailer – You need to select ‘Other SMTP’ here as you will be sending emails using your hosts SMTP server
• Return Path – Check this box to receive delivery notifications or bounced messages.

Note: If you want to use third-party mailers, then you can follow this guide to send WordPress emails via Gmail SMTP. We also have a similar guide for MailGun SMTP setup.

If you want to continue using your host, then you need to select Other SMTP and enter the SMTP server settings provided by hosting company.

• SMTP Host – This is the SMTP host address provided by your hosting company.
• Encryption – The encryption method used by your mail server to send emails. Usually it is TLS.
• SMTP Port – This is the port used by outgoing mail server.
• Auto TLS – This setting should be set to On
• Authentication – Needs to be On
• SMTP Username – This is usually the email address you are using to send emails
• SMTP Password – This is the password for the email account you are using to send emails. We don’t recommend saving SMTP password here. Instead, you nedd to store your password in wp-config.php file.

These settings are required to connect with any SMTP server. However, their values may differ from one WordPress hosting company to another.

Let’s see how to set up WP Mail SMTP plugin with different hosting companies.

Setting up WP Mail SMTP on Bluehost

Bluehost is one of the biggest hosting companies in the world and an officially recommended WordPress hosting provider.

We recommend Bluehost to all users who are starting a WordPress blog or making a small business website.

Following are the SMTP settings you will be using to connect WP Mail SMTP to Bluehost SMTP server.

• SMTP Host – mail.example.com
• Encryption – TLS
• SMTP Port – 587
• SMTP Username – Your email address (e.g. wordpress@example.com)
• SMTP Password – Your email account password

Setting up WP Mail SMTP on SiteGround

SiteGround is another popular WordPress hosting company. They offer excellent shared, managed, and WooCommerce hosting services.

Following are the SMTP settings you will be using to connect WP Mail SMTP with SiteGround servers.

• SMTP Host – example.com
• Encryption – TLS
• SMTP Port – 587
• SMTP Username – Your email address (e.g. wordpress@example.com)
• SMTP Password – Your email account password

Setting up WP Mail SMTP on HostGator

HostGator is another popular WordPress hosting company. WPBeginner is hosted with HostGator, and we have been using them for over 10 years.

Following are the SMTP settings you will be using to connect WP Mail SMTP with HostGator servers.

• SMTP Host – full.servername.com
• Encryption – SSL
• SMTP Port – 465
• SMTP Username – Your email address (e.g. wordpress@example.com)
• SMTP Password – Your email account password

You will notice that instead of using your domain as the SMTP Host, it uses the server name. You can find the server name from your cPanel hosting dashboard.

Simply, login to your cPanel, and you will see the full server name in the right column towards the bottom.

Setting up WP Mail SMTP on DreamHost

DreamHost is a popular WordPress hosting company. They have been around since 1997 (way before WordPress, Google, or Facebook) and offer shared WordPress hosting, managed, and VPS hosting plans.

Following are the SMTP settings you will be using to connect WP Mail SMTP with DreamHost servers.

• SMTP Host – full.servername.com
• Encryption – SSL
• SMTP Port – 465
• SMTP Username – Your email address (e.g. wordpress@example.com)
• SMTP Password – Your email account password

You will notice that Dreamhost doesn’t use your domain name as the mail server. Instead, they use different servers to manage emails, and you will need to find out which one is used by your hosting account.

You can do this by logging into your DreamHost hosting panel and then going to Support » Data Centers page. From here, you need to scroll down to the mail service section.

You will find the name of the email cluster under the details column next to your domain name.

Next, you need to visit DreamHost’s email configuration page and scroll down to ‘Where to find your mail hostname (cluster) name’ section. Here you can match your email cluster with the names in the table and copy the outgoing server address next to it.

Setting up WP Mail SMTP on InMotion Hosting

Following are the SMTP settings you will be using to connect WP Mail SMTP with InMotion Hosting servers.

• SMTP Host – server##.inmotionhosting.com
• Encryption – SSL
• SMTP Port – 465
• SMTP Username – Your email address (e.g. wordpress@example.com)
• SMTP Password – Your email account password

Note: In the SMTP host field, you need to replace ## with your server number. You can find this by logging in to your cPanel dashboard and then clicking on AMP details icon.

Setting up WP Mail SMTP on GoDaddy

GoDaddy is world’s most popular domain name registrar, managing more than 76 million domain names for over 17.5 million customers. They also offer different hosting plans (For details see our article on the difference between domain name and web hosting).

Following are the SMTP settings you will be using to connect WP Mail SMTP with GoDaddy shared hosting plans.

• SMTP Host – mail.example.com
• Encryption – TLS
• SMTP Port – 587
• SMTP Username – Your email address (e.g. wordpress@example.com)
• SMTP Password – Your email account password

Setting up WP Mail SMTP on iPage

Following are the SMTP settings you will be using to connect WP Mail SMTP with iPage hosting servers.

• SMTP Host – smtp.ipage.com
• Encryption – TLS
• SMTP Port – 587
• SMTP Username – Your email address (e.g. wordpress@example.com)
• SMTP Password – Your email account password

Setting up WP Mail SMTP on GreenGeeks

Following are the SMTP settings you will be using to connect WP Mail SMTP with GreenGeeks.

• SMTP Host – mail.example.com
• Encryption – SSL
• SMTP Port – 465
• SMTP Username – Your email address (e.g. wordpress@example.com)
• SMTP Password – Your email account password

Setting up WP Mail SMTP on JustHost

Following are the SMTP settings you will be using to connect WP Mail SMTP with JustHost.

• SMTP Host – mail.example.com
• Encryption – SSL
• SMTP Port – 465
• SMTP Username – Your email address (e.g. wordpress@example.com)
• SMTP Password – Your email account password

Setting up WP Mail SMTP with Third-Party Email Services

Some managed WordPress hosting companies do not offer email service as part of their hosting plan. In that case, you will need to use a third-party email service to send WordPress emails using SMTP.

The best way to send WordPress emails using SMTP is by using G Suite (formerly Google Apps for Work). It allows you to create professional business email addresses and use your existing domain name with popular Google apps like Gmail, Calendar, Google Drive, and more.

WP Mail SMTP allows you to easily configure WordPress to use Gmail servers for sending emails. This includes G Suite as well as your regular Gmail account. For detailed instructions, see our step by step guide on how to send WordPress emails using Gmail SMTP server.

You can also use MailGun to send WordPress emails. For details, see this guide on how to send WordPress emails via MailGun.

WP Mail SMTP also allows you to choose SendGrid as your mailer. You will just need to enter your API key which you can find under your SendGrid account.

We hope this article helped you learn how to set up WP Mail SMTP with any host. You may also want to see our guide on why you should never use WordPress to send your Newsletter emails.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

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How to Manage, Track, and Control File Downloads in WordPress

Are you looking for a file download manger for WordPress? While you can simply upload a file and add a download link in your post, it’s not scalable. A WordPress file download manager can help you easily manage, track, and control permissions on file downloads. You can even use it to sell file downloads. In this article, we will show you two easy ways to to manage, track, and control file downloads in WordPress.

23 Best WordPress Themes for Yoga Studios (2018)

Are you looking for a WordPress theme to design your yoga website? For a yoga studio, you will need a theme that can prominently showcase your classes, programs, and schedules. In this article, we have hand-picked the best yoga WordPress themes that you can use.

Building a Yoga Website with WordPress

How to Verify Your WordPress Site on Pinterest (Step by Step)

Do you want to verify your WordPress site on Pinterest? Verifying your website on Pinterest will unlock neat features like Pinterest analytics, ads program, stats for your photos, and more. In this article, we will show you how to easily verify your WordPress site on Pinterest.

Video Tutorial