When a WordPress website enters maintenance mode, the website’s content is hidden from visitors without being changed or otherwise affected. Visitors accessing your website when it is in maintenance mode see the maintenance screen instead of the website content.

Please keep in mind, that leaving your site in maintenance mode for too long can negatively impact your SEO if search engines cannot continue to index your site.

Your WordPress website enters maintenance mode automatically when you are updating your WordPress website or copying data between WordPress websites via WP Toolkit. If you are making changes to your website and want to temporarily hide it from visitors, you can manually put it into maintenance mode.

Enable WordPress Maintenance Mode with the WP Toolkit

1. Log into cPanel
2. On the left-hand menu, click WP Toolkit
   
3.  Find the WordPress site you want to enable Maintenance Mode for, and toggle Maintenance mode to On
   • If you wish to adjust the advanced settings of the Maintenance Mode feature, you can click on the settings slider button to view the following settings:
     
     • Restrict access to WordPress admin dashboard – Prevents the site admin from logging into WordPress when maintenance mode is enabled. This is useful if you need to ensure that staff are not modifying the site while the changes are made.
     • Change screen template – You can edit the template .phtml file if you wish to apply custom formatting to the maintenance mode window. This is an advanced feature.
     • Restore Default – Restores the default template settings.
   • You can additionally modify the on-screen messages:
     
   • And specify social media links for your existing profiles to reroute visitors, as well as provide a countdown timer to announce when your site will become available:
     
4. When finished, click Save

Disable WordPress Maintenance Mode with the WP Toolkit

To disable maintenance mode with the WP Toolkit, follow the steps 1-2 from the section Enable WordPress Maintenance Mode with the WP Toolkit.

Then un-check Maintenance mode, and click Save.