Are you having trouble finding the .htaccess file in WordPress? We are often asked by beginners ‘Where is my .htaccess file?’ and ‘Why I cannot find it on my WordPress site?’.
Sometimes you may need to edit the .htaccess file or delete it to fix a common WordPress errors. In this article, we will explain why you can’t find .htaccess file on your WordPress site, and how to easily locate it.
What is .htaccess file?
The .htaccess file is a server configuration file which tells your server how to handle certain things on your website. Like how to redirect users, password protect admin area, or protect some directories, etc.
It is located in your WordPress site’s root folder. WordPress uses it to manage redirects and permalinks.
The .htaccess file is an incredibly powerful configuration file and can be used to do a lot useful things. See our article on the most useful .htaccess tricks for WordPress for some examples.
Why I Can’t Find .htaccess File?
There are two common reasons for not finding the .htaccess file in your website’s root folder. It’s either hidden by your file manager software, or it doesn’t exist at all.
We will explain both of them with solutions.
1. Your FTP Client is Not Showing Hidden Files
The dot before the htaccess file name indicates that it is a hidden file. By default, when you connect to your WordPress hosting server using an FTP client, it will not show the hidden files.
To make hidden files visible, you will need to change your FTP client settings.
For example, in FileZilla, you can find the option under ‘Server » Force showing hidden files’ menu.
If you are using the File Manager app in cPanel, then you will find the option to show hidden files before launching the app.
For other FTP clients, you will find the option to show hidden files in app settings or preferences menu.
After enabling this option, you would be able to view all hidden files including .htaccess file for your WordPress site.
2. The .htaccess File Doesn’t Exist
The second most common reason for missing .htaccess file is that your WordPress site has not generated it yet.
WordPress automatically generates .htaccess file because it is required to properly redirect permalinks.
If your .htaccess file is missing, then the first thing you need to do is to visit Settings » Permalinks page and click on ‘Save Changes’ button without changing anything.
WordPress will now try to generate the .htaccess file for you.
On some rare occasion, WordPress may not be able to generate the .htaccess file due to file permissions issue.
In that case, it will show you a message at the bottom of the Settings » Permalinks page, saying that the ‘.htaccess file is not writeable’.
You will need need to manually create the .htaccess file and add the required code inside it.
Simply copy and paste this code in a text editor like Notepad. After that, you need to save it as .htaccess file on your desktop.
Now connect to your website using an FTP client and upload the .htaccess file from your desktop.
If you get an error while uploading the file, then you need to change the file permission for your root directory.
Let’s suppose all your WordPress files reside under /home/johnsmith/public_html/ directory.
This makes public_html folder your root directory. You need to go to its parent directory and right click on the public_html folder. Select File Permissions, which will open a file permissions dialog box.
Now enter 755 into the file permission dialog box and then try to upload your .htaccess file to the public_html folder.
We hope this article helped you find .htaccess file on your WordPress site. You may also want to see our WordPress troubleshooting guide to learn how to diagnose and fix WordPress issues all by yourself.
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Thank you. You saved my life.
You’re welcome, glad our guide was helpful
In my Cpanel there are so many .htaccess files so can i delete them or not?
If you have multiple with the same name for some reason, you may want to check with your hosting provider’s support in case it was set up for something specific to your hosting provider.
This worked perfectly, thank you!
You’re welcome
I still can’t find the .htaccess file. I’m using a free WP site (so plugins aren’t available), and there’s no “permalinks” section in the admin for me to manually create the file. What should I do?
Thanks!
WordPress.com does not give access to your htaccess file. If you wanted that you would need to use WordPress.org and we have our comparison guide on the two below:
https://www.wpbeginner.com/beginners-guide/self-hosted-wordpress-org-vs-free-wordpress-com-infograph/
After a php version update my site went down. The hosting company are no help at all. I read your blog and updated my permalinks file and all works fine now. Many thanks, Tom : )
Glad our recommendation was able to help
Thank you! Saved my day
Glad our guide could help
Thank you this artical is very help full
You’re welcome, glad our guide was helpful
Great! It was just hidden, in WinSCP
Glad our recommendation could help
Quite a Helpful article, thankyou. one question though do we really need .htaccess file as being an administrator?
Yes, your site should have an .htaccess file. It handles some things on your site and gives you more tools you can use.
This was so helpful, thank you!
You’re welcome, glad our guide was helpful
Thanks so much! This solve my issues, i was about to get crazy, thanks!
You’re welcome, glad our guide could help
Saved my day! Thanks
You’re welcome, glad our article could help
Thanks that was really helpful. I did not save changes for the first time and also the permission as you said. Once i did that i worked fine thanks again
You’re welcome, glad we could be helpful
Thanks for the help, this blog helps me a lot, i had been working to resolve this for 3 days.
in my case file name was not written, i have identified it with file type.
100% beginner also not an IT guy.
once again Thanks a lot
Glad our article could help yo fix the issue
Also you may not be able to the find .htaccess file on the site server, since NGNIX is being used.
You are correct, that is another possibility but not always a common one
hi. I tried to see if the file was hidden. This didn’t start showing .htaccess. I then went to permalinks and saved changes (even tried updating some settings and updating again) a few times. I didn’t get any text from WP. It just accepted the changes. I still can’t see the htaccess file.
Not sure why this is happening. Can you please help.
You may want to check your hosting provider to see if they see the htaccess on their end.
hey there,
I followed the instructions step by step, however I still cannot find the .htaccess -.-
when I create one on my mac with text pad (or should I use word doc?) and try to paste it via ftp (filezilla) in the ” / ” folder but it still does’nt work.
The links on my wordpress shows “404 Not Found nginx”
please help!!
You may want to ensure you don’t have a file extension on the end of your .htaccess file as that is one of the more common reasons it does not work.
Go in WordPress and then click on settings and then select permalinks and then select plain and then save changes
hey . i need your help regarding my cpanel . it shows only text and when i click on any tool it gets logged out. i have tried many ways to repair my cpanel but can’t resolved it . i m using cloudflare though.
Hi Abhishek,
Please contact your hosting provider. They will be able to fix this issue for you.
This probably worked once, but no longer. No message appears on the Permalinks page when you save it. Show Hidden Files in FileZilla doesn’t reveal the .htaccess file. Pretty much useless from the get-go.
Hi Don,
It still works. .htaccess file is hidden by default. If you cannot see it in your FTP client, then please try a different FTP program.
Very weird! Please help. I did find my .htaccess file and copied and pasted the code into it. Now all pages are secure except the home page. Any help would be appreciated.
thanks,
Ted
I have the same problem.
I have the same problem. No .htaccess using CuteFTP (yes, I enabled filters) and the file manager in Plesk. Does this mean there isn’t one??? Please answer!!!
Hi Carolina,
If your web hosting server is using a different software like Windows or Nginx then you may not be able ot find .htaccess file.
It helps a lot .. Thanks .. i can access again my website .
The htaccess rewrite worked! Thanks ever so much for your help. Brain is fried after a complete loss of dashboard today. I had to create a .htaccess file and upload it through ftp.
Thanks again
OMG thank you. I added this to my .htaccess file
php_value upload_max_filesize 64M
php_value post_max_size 64M
php_value max_execution_time 300
php_value max_input_time 300
FTP wouldn’t let me overwrite .htaccess so I uploaded it as .htaccess-new then deleted .htaccess and renamed .htaccess-new to .htaccess
Yay!
Hello,
I am unable to select any of the code in the box to recreate my .htaccess file. It appears to be an image file only…
Thanks.
Thank you! You saved my day, I started to get worried I will not fix this. I appreciate it, honestly.
Can you please tell me how to keep WP back end log in longer time when i am on back end for uploading? because due to SSL, it automatically logs out of the account in some minutes and ask me to log in again. this is troublesome, thank you
I have the same problem! did you find a solution?
please help.
thanks
The permalinks solution didn’t work for me either.
In cPanel I have a page that will allow me to edit 403 (forbidden) but when I click on the code to edit I’m absolutely lost which is very annoying as I’m sure it must be easy to do, if only I knew how!
Can anyone explain please?
Sincerely
Kay
Hi!
I am new to wordpress and have set up my wordpress site this weekend. To ensure it is safe, I followed the htaccess/htpasswd settings today and all worked fine.
After some hours, I could not access my wordpress site anymore but get the error message
[Tue Nov 01 20:31:36 2016] [authn_file:error] [pid 26428] [client xxx.xxx.xx.xxx] [host xxx.xxx.de] AH01620: Could not open password file: /XXX.htpasswd
How can I overcome this issue?
thanks for any help!
Axel
Please contact your hosting provider. They will be able to assist you better. Meanwhile, you can try steps mentioned in our WordPress troubleshooting guide.
You have a wonderful page. My only objection is that font sizes are too samall. I print everything I read
Why don’t you just zoom your browser window in to make the text larger?
i don’t want to use ftp client method. Tell me how to edit htaccess file via cpanel
thanks
it’s salve me
Thanks it really helped.
Keep sharing more wisdom.!
Really interesting and informative post. I like all posts of wpbeginner.com. nice website.
Hey.. I played around with WP rocket and cleared my .htaccess – Now i am missing elements and sections of my webpage. I have tired to disable minifying. But still nothing happens.
Really i have no idea of what made these sections disappear . Any one have an idea of what i should try?
Is there any way or some how I can make my audio wp content downloading be available to all mobile device,like if I just upload audio to W-P it is only some specific device that would be able to download it with streaming online.like I need help on how to make my audio link download on all mobile device.
Having tried the above I still can’t see my htacess file and I do not get the message saying not rewritable under permalinks. Can anybody help, I’ve been getting the 500 Internal Server Error for two days now and am desperate to update to the latest version of WordPress. My site is slow and shows the message frequently. Any help would be gratefully appreciated.
WP Maximum Execution Time Exceeded.
give it a try.
its working now i get relief.
thanks for your help.
i really appreciate your work.
thanks thanks thanks!!!
Thank you! You wake me up from the death!
Solved: Yesterday I started my second wp site, all went well until I noticed that all permalink options didn`t work except the default one, every time I changed to another permalink structure, I received the famous 404 error. I cross referanced with my first wp site, and noticed that the web.config file was not in the root. Obviously I copied and pasted the web.config file from my first site to my new site, refreshed and now all permalinks work fine.
dear can we use .htaccess Plugin by aubrey poortwood, is it bettter or not
thanks for this! Just ran into this and this helped me solve my issue.
Thanks you so much Balkhi, Your information is brilliant Boss. Thanks again.
It’s worth pointing out that your .htaccess file might be missing because you don’t need one. For instance the Nginx web server doesn’t use .htaccess files for security and performance reasons.
Hope you do not intended to leave permission at 755 for the file or anyone would be able to hack your site via that file no ?
755 is safe, 777 will make your files writable by anyone.
I had occasion to look around for some redirection plugins for WP, and I noticed that some implement “hit counters.” I suspect all of them have to put something in the .htaccess file. I would love to see an article that goes into more depth on redirection, link cloaking, and hit counters.
Isnt it easier co create .htacces right in cPanel (if you dont have it) rather than saving in notepad and uploading via ftp?
I think that way is more easier and faster.
Kasa yes this should work too, however many users don’t have access to cPanel. Some webhosts use their own hosting control panels.