How to Password Protect Your Entire WordPress Site

There are two ways to protect your entire WordPress site with a password:

• Select plug-in
• Server-level HTTP authentication

Of the two methods, the plugin method is more user-friendly and better suited for user-oriented websites, while HTTP authentication is better for protecting passwords for WordPress staging sites or other types of non-user-oriented websites.

How to Password Protect a WordPress Website with Plugins

To password-protect your entire WordPress site, we recommend using WPExperts' freePassword protection plug-inThis plugin is highly rated and can be found on Password Protected.

With password protection, you can use a single password to make the entire site content private. Additionally, it is possible to exclude specific posts, categories, post types, custom post types, and more.

It is possible to customize the appearance of password-protected screens using the free Login Designer plugin and add reCAPTCHA to prevent bots from accessing your site.

After installing and activating the plugin, you can go toSettings → Password protectionto configure the plugin's settings.

decide upon a candidatePassword Protection status box to enable password protection, and then in thenew passwordEnter the desired password in the box.

Another advantage of this plugin is that it also provides the option to whitelist certain types of users/requests as well as IP addresses. These can be configured as needed:

Once it's activated, anyone trying to access the site will need to enter a password on the lite WordPress login page:

How to Password Protect a WordPress Website with HTTP Authentication

With basic HTTP authentication (aka htpasswd protection), it's possible to add an extra layer of password protection before people load a website, which is why it's become a better choice for WordPress login or development sites.

When enabled, the WordPress site will require authentication for access. This can be changed at any time, or disabled when not needed.