Do you want to add a custom login URL in WordPress?
Adding a custom login URL in WordPress can help improve your WordPress security and offer your visitors a better experience.
In this article, we’ll show you how to add a custom login URL in WordPress, step by step.
Why Add a Custom Login URL in WordPress?
WordPress is the most popular CMS platform and powers over 40% of websites. Because it’s so popular, it’s often a target of hackers who use techniques like brute force attacks to try to log in to your dashboard.
Bots and hackers trying to get into your site know the common login URLs like wp-admin and wp-login and will try to get access to your site using these URLs first.
By changing the WordPress login page URL, you improve your site’s security and make it more difficult for hackers to get access to your WordPress website.
Another reason to add a custom login link in WordPress is to offer a better user experience. You can customize the URL and design of your login page so it matches your branding and existing WordPress theme.
With that said, let’s show you how to add a custom login URL in WordPress in just a few simple steps.
Video Tutorial
If you’d prefer written instructions, just keep reading.
How to Add a Custom Login URL in WordPress Using SeedProd
The simplest way to add a custom login URL in WordPress is by using a WordPress plugin. This lets you simply change your WordPress login URL without editing any core WordPress files.
We recommend using the SeedProd plugin. It’s the best drag-and-drop WordPress page builder used by over 1 million sites. With this plugin, you can easily customize your SeedProd login page and change the URL.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate the plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Note: There is a free version of SeedProd, but we’ll be using the premium version for this tutorial since it has the login page templates we need.
Upon activation, you need to go to SeedProd » Settings and enter your product license key.
You can find your product license key under your account information on the SeedProd website.
After that, navigate to SeedProd » Landing Pages and click the ‘Set up a Login Page’ button.
Then, you’ll be taken to a screen that has all of the login page templates.
You can choose one of the pre-made professional templates or select the ‘Blank’ template to build a login page from scratch.
For this tutorial, we’ll choose the ‘Geo Login Page’ template.
Simply hover over the template you want to use and click the check icon.
This brings up a popup where you can name your new login page and enter a custom login page URL.
Next, click the ‘Save and Start Editing the Page’ button.
This will take you to the page editor screen.
You can customize every element of the page with the drag-and-drop builder.
The left side has blocks and sections you can add to the page, and the right side shows a real-time preview of what it looks like.
When you click on any page element, it will bring up a menu to customize it further.
You can customize your login page as much as you want, but we’ll leave the default settings for this tutorial.
For more details on all the customization options, see our ultimate guide on how to create a custom WordPress login page.
Next, you need to click the arrow next to the ‘Save’ box and select ‘Publish’ from the drop-down.
Now, it’s time to change the default login URL to your new login page.
First, click the ‘Page Settings’ menu option at the top of the page.
Then, scroll down the page until you see the ‘Redirect the Default Login Page’ option. Simply click the ‘Enable’ toggle, and you’ll see it turn orange.
This will redirect the default WordPress login page to the new page you just created.
Don’t forget to click the ‘Save’ button again to make sure all of your changes are now live.
Change WordPress Login Page URL With a Free Plugin
We recommend using the SeedProd plugin above because it also lets you easily customize your login page to match the design of your site.
However, some users will want to keep the default WordPress login page and only change the login page URL.
To do this, you can use the free plugin called WPS Hide Login. This plugin lets you simply change the login URL without customizing the page.
Once the plugin is installed and activated, navigate to Settings » WPS Hide Login.
Then, add your new login page URL in the ‘Login url’ box.
You can also add a redirect URL in the ’Redirection url’ box.
This will redirect people to another page on your WordPress blog when they try to access the default wp-login.php page, and they aren’t logged in.
After that, click ‘Save Changes’.
Now, all visitors will automatically be sent to your new login page URL.
We hope this article helped you learn how to add a custom login URL in WordPress. You may also want to see our guide on how to choose the best web design software and our expert pick of the best email marketing services for small businesses.
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Gerard says
The plugin you refer to has seen no updates in over 2 years. might wanna update your post.
Ashfaq says
there is a problem with these plugins.
if we enter just LOGIN instead of wp-admin or anything else we redirected to the dashboard login page
PseudoGeek says
I got tired of getting hundreds of brute-force login attempts per day from around the world. WordFence blocked them, but I got tired of the constant barrage of notifications of blocked attempts. I installed a different plugin than what you’re recommending – WPS Hide Login – on all my sites, and changed the login location from the plugin’s default to something I made up. Now I get ZERO brute-force login attempts because the bad guys can’t find wp-admin any more – it just throws a 404 page not found error. Please tell me why you think this does not improve the security of my sites!
Syams says
Dear, how to make like this login?
WPBeginner Support says
Take a look at our tutorial on how to password protect your WordPress admin directory
Admin
Rod Salm says
This is built into another plugin I love, iThemes Security (formerly known as Better WP Security). It provides this functionality and many more simple to implement security features for your WP install.
Rod Salm
jusTravis says
The custom login url is 1 of the main reasons I used iThemes Security, but I switched to WP All-In-One Security because it also offers a honeypot on the login page.
Dan Wheeler says
An Many of your posts you recommend plugins that are out of date. Login Lockdown is over a year old. You should keep your recommendations to plugins that have been tested and updated recently. Reader’s following your instructions may get undesired results following your recommendations.
WPBeginner Support says
Please see our article, Should you install plugins not tested with your WordPress version. We test all plugins that we recommend, and we regularly update old articles to replace expired plugins with new and better plugins. We also rely on our users to alert us when a plugin we recommended has expired or is no longer available.
Admin
Shantanu Patil says
Sir i am getting error in the Theme. I installed ColorMag theme and In the homepage the images of the post is not show my Blog link
WPBeginner Support says
Try deactivating all your WordPress plugins, and then check to see if this resolves your problem. If it does, then this means that there is a plugin causing the issue. Activate each plugin one by one and test your website after activating each plugin until you find the culprit. If the plugins are not the issue then you may want to checkout our guide on fixing common image issues in WordPress.
Admin
Lars B says
I would like to know more aboth this ….
“…. a custom WordPress login URL will help them improve their website security, it’s not true at all.
Changing the default login URL doesn’t improve your security at all. It’s just a matter of personal preference that’s all.”
Could you please explain this in detail ?
If the site’s login URL is strickly for the owner and administrator – and therefore there’s no public links to the custom login – Wouldn’t a custom URL to the login in this case be an improvement of the security?
WPBeginner Support says
Accessing /wp-admin/ directory will redirect users to custom login URL.
Admin
Lars B says
I use iThemeSecurity …. and I change the login-URL to something custom line …. if someone is trying to find /wp-admin they will find the “Page Not Found”-page
…. or is there a way around this that I’m not aware of??
Dave says
If you try to access wp-admin and it gives you the custom URL, the plugin isn’t doing a very good job of hiding the URL. Plugins like iThemes Security, as Lars mentioned, and Rename WP-Login will throw an error message if you try to access the admin area or default login URL in any way that isn’t the customized one.
It does help the security because the attacker can’t find the form to attack it.