A Backup plugin and WordPress staging plugin have become popular together, but what are they, and are they necessary? Making a staging site is always a wonderful place to start, whether you want to update your website, give your page a new design, or are establishing a brand-new site and don’t know how to start.
Making updates to your website without knowing if they will work is one of the riskiest things you can do.
Before implementing changes to your live website, staging enables you to test them in a secure setting. Because staging regions are hidden from search engines, this is the ideal way to update WordPress and execute design changes.
Keep reading and exploring to learn about what is the best staging website WordPress plugin and how to create WordPress staging site in 2026.
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Key Takeaways
- A WordPress staging plugin lets you safely test updates, plugins, and design changes without risking your live website.
- Because staging sites are hidden from search engines, SEO problems may be avoided while you experiment and correct mistakes.
- One-click cloning, backups, and simple deployment to live sites are provided by plugins such as WP Staging, BlogVault, and UpdraftPlus.
- Using a staging environment speeds up and secures WordPress updates, minimizes downtime, and avoids expensive errors.
What is a WordPress Staging Site?
A staging WordPress site is an exact replica of a live website. In order to test and experiment with a website before it goes live without impacting the actual site, web developers set up a staging site.
One may test modifications like themes, add code snippets, install new plugins, or resolve problems like plugin conflicts or bugs on the site. The live site is not at risk from any of these activities. Additionally, it’s simple to post modifications and updates to the live server.
What is a WordPress Staging Plugin?
Before implementing new features, upgrades, redesigns, and other significant changes to your live site, a staging WordPress plugin provides a safe testing environment. It lowers the possibility of mistakes by enabling you to move changes to and from a staging site.
Editing your staging site rather than your live site is generally a smart idea. It will help you understand how these modifications will affect the functioning and look of your actual website.
You may develop a staging website WordPress with WordPress staging plugins. You won’t have to worry about harming your live website or turning off visitors when you use this service.
Top 5 WordPress Staging Plugins For Safe Website Testing
Now we will discuss the top 5 staging WordPress plugins you can use for the safest web testing. You can find the best WordPress staging plugin in our list as per your requirements. So, here is the list of the 5 best staging WordPress plugins:
Total Upkeep
For your WordPress website, Total Upkeep is an effective all-in-one manager. BoldGrid offers a plugin called TotalUpkeep that lets you make backups of your website. A staging site can then be manually created using these backups.
To restore the backup from the dashboard, the plugin must be installed on your staging domain; however, once installed and restored, you will have an identical duplicate of your primary website.
Depending on the size of your website, cloning it simply takes a few minutes if you currently have a WordPress installation ready on the new staging location.
Key Features:
- More than 100,000 WordPress installations are now running.
- Tested up to WordPress version 6.0.2
- One-click installation of the staging
- org gives it a rating of 4.7 out of 5
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BlogVault
Website backups, security audits, uptime tracking, remote WordPress upgrades, and WordPress staging are all included in BlogVault, an all-in-one WordPress backup and security solution. It’s a hosted service that uses a WordPress plugin to link to your website.
With the press of a button, you may establish a new password-protected staging area. BlogVault will generate the staging site for you; all you need to do is choose the backup and PHP version you wish to use. Simply click the “Merge Details” button to indicate the differences and authorize the push of modifications to your live website when you’re ready. The entire procedure is simple.
Key Features:
- A high-end WordPress backup solution
- Staging areas
- secure SFTP access
- PHP version checking
- password security
UpdraftPlus
Another WordPress staging plugin that primarily functions as a backup solution is Team UpdraftPlus, a WordPress backup and migration tool. It enables you to set up a staging site on their servers; this option requires the purchase of UpdraftTokens.
You can choose to purchase these tokens on a subscription or one-time basis because they are less expensive than UpdraftPlus Premium.
Although you may purchase their UpdraftMigrator, which enables you to migrate or clone your site within your server instead of UpdraftPlus, the backup features allow you to generate a backup and restore on a fresh WordPress installation (a manual clone).
You can handle file and database transfers within WordPress when you utilize the UpdraftMigrator plugin. This lessens typical transfer problems, such as missing media files or URLs.
You may check modifications without compromising the functionality of the live site since the staging environment replicates your production database.
Key Features:
- More than 3 million WordPress installations are currently running.
- Tested up to WordPress version 6.0.2
- One-click installation of staging
- 5 stars out of 5, according to WordPress.org
WP Staging
In a subdirectory of your primary WordPress installation, WP Staging generates an identical replica of your website. Moreover, you are continually reminded that you are working on the staging site by the unique orange admin bar at the top.
You may clone your website using the free version of this WordPress staging plugin. In other words, you may make a staging site for free using your live site.
However, you must select pro packages if you want to migrate your staging site to your live site or clone to an external database, subdomain, custom subdomain, or custom destination directory. The one-time purchase price ranges from $89 to $499.
This cost also covers a free transfer of your website to a different domain name or server.
Key Features:
- More than 60,000 WordPress installations are currently running.
- Tested with WordPress 6.3.
- Installing and removing staging with a single click
- 9 stars out of 5, according to WordPress.org
- Backup features (Pro Version)
WPvivid
WPvivid is a single plugin that offers staging, migrations, and backups. You may choose the location of the copy, such as a new database or a subdirectory, using its staging tool. When you wish to keep test data entirely apart from your actual configuration, that degree of flexibility is helpful.
Basic stage creation is covered in the free edition, which is sufficient for many small websites. Users can upgrade to the Pro plan if they need to move modifications back to the live site.
Additionally, this WordPress staging plugin comes with helpful add-ons that enable standard site maintenance, such as database snapshots and image cleansing tools.
Key Features:
- Staging to distinct databases or subfolders
- Tools for migration and backup include
- Snapshots of databases
- Pro features that are optional for making changes live
- Additional resources for handling unneeded media
Also Read: Best WordPress ChatGPT Plugins: Revolutionize Your Website Conversations
How To Create WordPress Staging Site?
Here’s how you can create a WordPress staging site:
- For the staging website, you must first establish a subdomain. Click the Subdomains link on the dashboard of your hosting account; most, if not all, hosting companies will provide this feature.
- After giving the subdomain a name, click “Create.”
- The subdomain will now be added and visible on the hosting provider’s dashboard, often known as the control panel.
- The next step is to set up an FTP account specifically for the staging environment. This will ensure that everything stays apart and that you don’t unintentionally alter the live website. Simply navigate to your web hosting provider dashboard and complete the FTP accounts section. Moreover, one crucial warning is that you must ensure that the directory corresponds to the subdomain’s directory.
- The live site must now be uploaded to the staging area. To accomplish this, locate the phpMyAdmin option on the dashboard of your hosting company and select Operations or a comparable option. However, here, you must select Copy Database To and provide the staging site’s database name. You can make a backup of your database and import it if this option isn’t accessible for whatever reason.
- WordPress staging plugin, themes, and other components may now be copied, and you can implement your modifications whenever you see fit.
FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions)
What Is The Best WordPress Staging Plugin?
Although there isn’t a single “best,” the best WordPress staging plugins are WP Staging, TotalUpkeep, InstaWP, Duplicator, and UpdraftPlus.
Is The WP Staging Plugin Free?
The WP Staging plugin has a very capable free version that allows you to clone your WordPress site, create a staging site, and even perform simple backups and restorations.
Does WordPress Have A Staging Site?
Indeed, there isn’t a built-in staging feature for self-hosted websites in WordPress.
Why Are People Moving Away From WordPress?
WordPress’s bloated performance, security flaws, complicated upkeep (plugins/updates), and antiquated architecture are driving people away.
Conclusion
A crucial tool for properly carrying out website upgrades, testing, and revisions is website staging. Therefore, you will significantly minimize downtime and avoid serious configuration problems by integrating a WordPress staging plugin into your system. Moreover, a slightly different mix of automation, control, and cost is provided by each of the above-mentioned plugins.