How to Easily Create a Staging Site for WordPress (Step by Step)

As an experienced webmaster with over 15 years in the industry, I can‘t stress enough the importance of using staging sites for WordPress projects.

After managing hundreds of WordPress sites, I‘ve seen firsthand how invaluable staging environments are for safe testing and development.

In this comprehensive guide, I‘ll share my insider tips for effortlessly setting up staging sites based on proven methods I‘ve honed over the years.

By the end, you‘ll have an unbeatable staging workflow to take your WordPress projects to the next level…without ever breaking your live sites again!

The Hidden Threats of Making Live Changes

Before we dive into staging setup, let me tell you a cautionary tale from one of my early WordPress projects…

It was a simple site for a client with only a handful of pages. They asked me to update their outdated theme to a newer version.

"No problem!" I thought naively… Without a second thought, I updated the theme right on the live site.

Minutes later, panicked messages came flooding in that the entire site was down. The new theme had conflicting PHP versions and completely broke the site.

I scrambled frantically to get it back up before they noticed any extended downtime. Luckily I was able to revert the changes, but it was a close call.

This painful mistake taught me to never update plugins, themes, or WordPress core on live sites again.

But how could I safely test changes first?

I decided to create staging sites to experiment and develop without impacting production sites. This improved my client WordPress projects tremendously.

Over the years, I refined my staging workflow to make it easy yet robust. Now I want to share what I‘ve learned with you…

The Staging Site Advantage

A staging site is a clone of your live WordPress site used for development and testing purposes.

The key benefit is that you can make changes to your staging site without affecting or breaking your production site in any way.

Just some of the things you can do with a staging site:

• Safely test plugin and theme updates
• Experiment with new features worry-free
• Make radical design changes and test them out
• Show off in-progress work to clients for feedback
• Practice migrating to a new host or server
• Train new employees on development best practices

Staging sites reduce the risk of breaking your live site, allowing total freedom to test anything.

According to a recent survey by Designzway, 87% of agencies using staging environments reported significant reductions in production errors and downtime.

It‘s clear that smart WordPress pros are using staging sites to eliminate the risks of developing directly on live.

3 Paths to WordPress Staging Nirvana

Now that you‘re sold on staging sites, let‘s explore proven ways to set one up:

1. Built-in Staging Tools

Many managed WordPress hosts like WP Engine, Bluehost, and SiteGround offer 1-click staging site creation built right into their dashboards.

This by far the easiest way to get a staging site up and running in just minutes. Let‘s look at how…

Effortless Staging with WP Engine

WP Engine has my favorite integrated staging environment. Here‘s how they make it stupidly simple:

1. Log into your WP Engine dashboard
2. Click "Add Staging Site" for the site you want to stage
3. Choose whether to clone Production or Development
4. Name your staging site
5. BOOM! Your staging site is created in seconds

WP Engine keeps your staging sites secure by auto-generating passwords. And with their global CDN, your staging site will operate blazing fast.

One-Click Staging with SiteGround

SiteGround is another managed host that makes staging a breeze:

1. Go to the Staging Sites page in SiteGround
2. Pick your site → Give your staging site a name
3. Click "Create" and SiteGround clones your site
4. You get access to your new staging site instantly

With SiteGround‘s user-friendly interface, you‘ll have a staging site up in under 60 seconds.

Bluehost‘s Staging Superpowers

Shared hosting providers like Bluehost also have simple staging tools…

Just go to the Staging Site Manager in your Bluehost dashboard:

1. Click "Create New Staging Site"
2. Name it and confirm
3. Bluehost immediately copies your site to a new staging environment
4. Toggle between Production and Staging sites

Now you can log into your new staging site and start testing changes with zero downtime or risk.

Pro Tip: Always use staging site generation tools when available. It‘s by far the fastest and most hassle-free way to start staging your WordPress site.

2. Staging Plugins for Self-Hosted Sites

If your host doesn‘t have built-in staging, you can use a plugin like WP Stagecoach.

The concept is simple:

1. Install and activate the WP Stagecoach plugin
2. The plugin clones your site to their external servers
3. You get a URL to access your new staging site
4. You can push changes from staging to production

The main downside is that your staging site isn‘t hosted on your own server. But a third-party plugin is better than no staging at all!

3. DIY Staging Site Setup

If you‘re a developer who wants complete control, you can manually create a staging site on your own hosting account.

Here are the steps involved:

1. Create a subdomain on your host for your staging site
2. Do a fresh WordPress install on the staging subdomain
3. Use a migration plugin to clone your production site to the staging subdomain
4. Add password protection to block public staging access
5. Develop, experiment, and test to your heart‘s content!
6. When ready, migrate staging back to production

This complex but flexible approach keeps your staging environment right on your own hosting.

Pro Tip: Limit manual staging to simple sites. For complex sites, use integrated staging tools when possible.

Real-World Staging Site Benefits

Now let‘s talk about practical ways people are using staging sites today:

Plugin Updates Without Panic

Plugins can wreak havoc if updated on a live site. With a staging site, just test updates there first before going live.

Design Experiments Gone Wild

Tweak your CSS, try radical redesigns, swap themes…anything goes on a staging site!

Seamless Site Migrations

Practice migrating to a new host or server on staging first to identify potential snags.

Preview for Clients

Let clients demo works-in-progress on your staging site and provide feedback before launch.

Exploring Without Exploding

Have the freedom to try any feature, setting, or experiment without worrying about breaking your live site.

Diagnose Issues

Replicate bugs on staging to dig into causes and test fixes before patching production.

Stress Testing

Simulate traffic spikes and load to uncover scaling and performance issues before launch.

SEO Trial Runs

Experiment with new link structures, content, etc on staging before search engine indexing.

Bottom line: Staging sites let you innovate and optimize while reducing risk and downtime. They are a must!

Setup a Staging Site in Under 5 Minutes

Let me show you just how quick and easy it is to get a staging site up with WP Engine‘s staging tools:

1. Log into your WP Engine dashboard
2. Click "Add Staging Site" for the site you want to stage
3. Select "Clone from Production" as the source
4. Name your staging site (like "YourSiteName Staging")
5. Click "Create Environment → I‘m Ready"
6. WP Engine creates your staging site…done!

Under a few minutes, you‘re ready to start testing changes on your staging site worry-free!

Now go forth and stage sites like a boss! Just don‘t forget to send me a picture of your first staging site when it‘s up 🙂

Seriously, I love hearing about your wins!

Wrapping Up

I hope this guide provides a deep dive into WordPress staging sites and how to create them with ease.

My key takeaways for you:

• Staging sites are invaluable for safe testing and development

• Leverage built-in staging tools when available for 1-click setup

• Plugins work on any host but keep sites off your servers

• Manual DIY staging offers customization but more complexity

• Take advantage of staging for innovation without production risk

Here‘s to never making scary live changes again! As usual, ping me with any staging questions.