How to Use WP-CLI on Shared Hosting

WP-CLI is the command-line tool for WordPress. It lets you update plugins, reset a user, change your site's address or flush caches in seconds, without opening the dashboard. On Domain India cPanel and DirectAdmin hosting the wp command is already in your jailed shell; you only need SSH switched on for your account.

1. What you need first

To get SSH switched on, contact support on live chat or open a ticket at /client/support/new. Setting up your key and connecting are covered step by step in enabling and accessing jailed SSH.

2. Connect and check WP-CLI works

Connect with your control panel username and your key (your details are on the Access tab of your hosting service in the client area):

ssh -i ~/.ssh/id_ed25519 -p 22 [email protected]

On cPanel you can also use Terminal inside cPanel once shell access is enabled for your account. Then go to the folder that holds wp-config.php and check WP-CLI:

cd ~/public_html
wp --info
wp core version

If your WordPress site is in a subfolder or an addon domain's folder, cd there instead, or add --path=/home/yourusername/folder to any command.

3. Everyday commands

Updates

wp core check-update
wp core update
wp core update-db
wp plugin update --all
wp theme update --all

Take a backup before a big update; see section 6.

Plugins and themes

wp plugin list
wp plugin activate akismet
wp plugin deactivate akismet
wp plugin delete old-plugin
wp theme list
wp theme activate twentytwentyfive

Users

wp user list
wp user create jane [email protected] --role=editor
wp user update 1 --prompt=user_pass

--prompt=user_pass asks for the new password instead of typing it on the command line, where it would be saved in your shell history.

Caches and rewrite rules

wp cache flush
wp transient delete --all
wp rewrite flush

4. Fixing common problems

White screen or a crash after a plugin update. Turn all plugins off, check the site loads, then turn them back on one at a time:

wp plugin deactivate --all
wp plugin activate plugin-name

Locked out of wp-admin. Reset your own user's password with wp user update yourlogin --prompt=user_pass, rather than creating extra admin accounts you may forget to delete.

Moving to a new domain or to https. wp search-replace changes the old address everywhere in the database and handles WordPress's serialized data safely. Always do a dry run first:

wp search-replace 'https://old-domain.in' 'https://new-domain.in' --skip-columns=guid --dry-run
wp search-replace 'https://old-domain.in' 'https://new-domain.in' --skip-columns=guid

The full method, including redirects, is in moving a WordPress site from one URL to another.

5. What works differently on shared hosting

• Your resource limits apply. Everything you run over SSH counts towards your account's CPU, memory and process limits, so run big jobs (for example search-replace on a large shop) at a quiet time.
• No root. You cannot install system packages or change server settings. WP-CLI works on your own WordPress sites only.
• Server cache. Our cPanel servers have a caching proxy in front of Apache. After a change, test with a query string such as ?t=123 added to the URL.
• Prefer the dashboard? On cPanel, WP Toolkit and Softaculous handle updates and installs without a command line.

6. Back up before you change anything

WP-CLI changes your live site immediately, and there is no undo. Before updates or a search-replace, download a backup from JetBackup 5 or export the database in phpMyAdmin; see how can I download a backup of my site.

7. Where Domain India fits

Jailed SSH with WP-CLI suits site owners and developers who manage several WordPress sites. Prices on the cards are live and exclude 18% GST.

Frequently asked questions

Ready to use WP-CLI? Ask support to enable jailed SSH, set up your key with the SSH guide, and keep the WordPress guide at hand.