Optimizing Your WordPress Database

You would have serious issues if the WordPress databases that run in your website’s background weren’t there. Although they may be invisible to your visitors, they serve a vital purpose and without them, your site would not perform properly.

It is imperative that you properly maintain and manage your WordPress databases. Doing that means using the proper tools to keep them backed up, updated, and working properly.

Table of Contents

Database Management

WordPress database management isn’t anything difficult. It is simple but essential. There are plug-ins that will manage your databases by doing the following:

Back up your site’s databases
Delete any unnecessary or unused fields
Drop empty tables
Optimize databases for top performance
Run any needed queries

If your databases get weighed down with data and tables that they don’t need, it will slow them way down. You can think of it like sweeping out the cobwebs and keeping things in tidy, good working condition.

Your visitors should have a good experience. So, you want to make certain that everything is optimized, whether it’s your published content or smooth-running website. Database optimization is an important part of that process.

Let’s go over some of those things that could be weighing your site down causing it to be slow. These may be items that aren’t so apparent:

Spam or unapproved comments posted on your blog
Any unused fields and tables in your existing databases
Any items that weren’t properly deleted

You may forget to delete comments that you didn’t approve to be posted – and if not deleted correctly, then the data from the comment can still be hanging out on your site invisibly. So, if you make the effort to make maintaining your databases a part of your routine, then you can be sure your site is free of any junk weighing it down. Your goal is to keep it working as fast and as effectively as possible.

The great thing is that you don’t have to manually manage your databases. There are plugins to do the job for you, and many are free.

Plugins and Tools

The following are reputable tools that are highly recommended to keep your site working in top condition.

WP-DBManager

This is a plugin that does it all. It optimizes and repairs your databases and removes tables and fields that aren’t needed. But, it will also perform regular database back-ups for you.

WP-Optimize

This is WordPress’s most downloaded tool for optimization. Even though It is free, it has features such as automatic weekly or monthly clean-ups. Because of its accessibility on mobile devices, you can use it from almost anywhere.

WP Clean Up

This is another free plugin for maintenance and optimization. It offers manual options that can be triggered with just a few keystrokes, along with database sweeps for unnecessary files.

WP Sweep

This free plugin removes unapproved and spam comments and gets rid of unused drafts. It performs regular sweeps to delete forgotten and unused data.

These plugins are all free and are offered from WordPress directly. The benefit is that they use the correct WordPress protocol and WordPress delete functions. That is to say, you run the risk when you install plugins not available through WordPress that they may not be able to properly optimize your site.

You should install at least one of the above-suggested WordPress plugins and get it started to work for you. Especially, if your site has not been optimized and has been running without routine maintenance, you will be surprised at the results. For more information on using WordPress see our previous post, Beyond WordPress Basics.

You can see how simple routine WordPress maintenance is. With a little bit of effort on your part and some free helpful tools, your site will be running efficiently for your visitors.

Terry
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