How to install WordPress locally for beginners

Here is the complete guide on how to install WordPress locally step by step. Inside I have discussed the easiest ways to do so. This article includes a lot of images so please be patient if you have a little slow internet.

For starting a blog there are many platforms available like blogger, Wix, WordPress, etc. if you are thinking about starting a blog in WordPress then it is very important to have proper knowledge about WordPress. Here the question is how you could gain knowledge before getting live on the blog.

Simple answers are, Watch Youtube videos, read articles, or as many expert bloggers are saying just start your blog and then learn with the process. But by watching videos and reading articles you never get practical knowledge of how WordPress works.

Directly starting the blog and thinking that you will learn the functions and working through the process. that is also not a very good idea because by doing so you will be wasting your precious time in learning the functions and tricks rather than writing articles or promoting the blog

So here is the solution. I suggest you should install the WordPress locally on your systems. learn the working, get used to it. and when you know all the tricks of using WordPress efficiently then start your blog.

Why you would install WordPress locally

• Learn WordPress and its components like themes and plugins
• Test your site before going live / create stagging environment
• Can do various experiments
• You can perform troubleshooting and install new features
• Only you can access your site

What are the servers and options available

• WordPress by Bitnami
• Xampp Server
• Wamp Server/Lamp/Mamp
• And many more

WordPress by Bitnami

Rating is provided by intechverse on the basis of easiness to install and easiness to use.

This is one of the easiest way of installing WordPress (offline WordPress) on your computer. simply type WordPress by Bitnami in google and open the website and download it. Bitnami WordPress file is around 200MB depending on your internet speed file would be downloaded in a few minutes. Start the installation process. Press next.

After downloading. Start the installation process by pressing next. on the next screen provide the detail carefully as it is important while login to WordPress after installing. The details are your Real Name, Email Address, Login Username (which will be used when login to local WordPress) and of course password

Bingo you have successfully installed the WordPress by Bitnami. Easy as eating ice-cream. After clicking finish, a localhost page will automatically open. Press Access WordPress.

For login to your WordPress dashboard, just type in the URL localhost/Wordpress/login and hit enter. Or type localhost/Wordpress/wp-login and hit Enter

Xampp Server

This is one of the easiest and most commonly used method to install WordPress locally. In Xampp  A stands for an Apache server, M stands for MariaDB/MySQL, P stands for PHP, P stands for Perl and of course, X stands for cross-platform. cross-platform means it can be run on any operating system environment.

XAMPP is completely free and very easy to install Apache Distribution for Linux, Solaris, Windows, and Mac OS X. With Xampp you can easily test your site locally (offline) before actually going live. Xampp package includes Apache web server, MySQL, PHP, Perl, an FTP server and phpMyAdmin.

Components of Xampp

Here I am not going in depth of the Xampp sever’s components, I am just giving basic overview

1. Apache webserver – it is an open-source server platform
2. MySQL /MariaDB-it is database application MySQL stands for structure query language
3. PHP Php is preprocessor hypertext programing language it is server-side programing language commonly used for developing CMS (Content Management Systems)
4. Perl is programing language

How to install Xampp server on your system

Step #1 Download the Xampp server

Go to websites named apachefriends

Step #2 Install and activate the package

Select the components you want you to install we are installing Apache, MySQL, PHP, and Perl. Other components are not as required in this process, but of course, if you want to install other components, you can install them there is no harm in installing other components

After finishing the installation, launch Xampp server by right click on the icon and run as administrator. It is necessary to launch Xampp with admin permissions.

Step #3 Starting the services

After launching the Xampp control panel, you need to check in the check button to install the service modules like Apache and MySQL, when you have installed both the modules then a green tick will appear in the checkbox in front of the module name. Now press the start button and wait for a few minutes it might take some time to successfully start the modules

If everything goes right then after clicking on the admin in the Apache module you will be redirected to the localhost\dashboard page

Step #4 Installing WordPress inside Xampp folder

Now we have successfully installed the Xampp server on our PC. The next step is to download WordPress. Click here to download WordPress. Now you have downloaded the WordPress Zip file. The next step is to UnZip the WordPress zip file into the htdocs folder inside the Xampp folder. before unzipping the file inside the htdocs folder make sure to create a new folder named your site. For example I am creating a project name testmysite.

Step #4 Create database with the help of phpmyadmin

After Unzipping the WordPress we need to set up the database. with the help of Phpmyadmin we can easily set up the database. Go into PHPMyAdmin control panel by click in the Xampp control panel’s Mysql module admin. And then create the database with the same name that you have created for your test site. In my case my database name is testmysite

Now click on the admin button of the Apache server in the Xampp control panel. localhost\dashboard will open by default. you need to type in your site name(site name can be the same as the folder name that you have created inside htdocs folder). In my case my localhost address is localhost/testmysite

WordPress installation page will open.

Congratulation you have successfully created your local WordPress site. With default theme, your site would look like this

Other Servers except Xampp / Alternatives

LAMP is also a very commonly used web server. LAMP stands for Linux, Apache HTTP, MySQL relational database management system, and PHP/Perl/Python. Both Wamp and Mamp are its adapted variations according to the Operating systems

Wamp Server is created by Romain Bourdon. it is a variation of LAMP Server. Wamp stands for Windows, Apache, MySQL, and PHP/Perl/Python. W stands for windows which simply means it only available for Windows Operating Systems. All the features are the same as of Xampp server. and its installing is almost the same. if you have successfully installed the Xampp server from the above instruction then you could easily install and work with Wamp server too.

Mamp Server It is simply LAMP Server for Macintosh OS. other abbreviations remain the same except for M for Mac Os. you can use various component management systems like WordPress Joomla drupal. A premium version of Mamp is also available.

These are the easily available and commonly used alternatives to the Xampp server for installing WordPress or any other CMS. Installation and working of all the servers are almost the same. you can easily install these or any other servers like AMPPS, UwAmp Server, The Uniform Server, or DesktopServer.

Conclusion

After each and every step in the process to install WordPress locally. You have now fully functional offline environment for WordPress designing and testing. I hope that I have provided proper step by step guide if you find anything that I might have missed don’t hesitate to comment in the comment box below

Frequently asked Questions