How to Fix the 403 Forbidden Error in WordPress

Are you dealing with the 403 Forbidden error on your WordPress site? It is one of the most dreadful errors that a WordPress beginner can come across. In this article, we will show you how to easily fix the 403 forbidden error in WordPress.

Fixing 403 Forbidden error in WordPress

What is a 403 Forbidden – Access Denied Error in WordPress?

WordPress shows codes and messages when an error occurs on your website. See our list of most common WordPress errors and how to fix them.

403 Forbidden status code shown on a WordPress site

403 Forbidden error code is shown when your server permissions don’t allow access to a specific page.

This is why the error is usually accompanied by the text:

403 Forbidden – You don’t have permission to access ‘/’ on this server.

Additionally, a 403 Forbidden error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.

There are different scenarios when you can see this error. For example:

  • 403 Forbidden – Access denied on wp-admin or WordPress login page.
  • 403 Forbidden – during WordPress install.
  • 403 Forbidden error when visiting any page on your WordPress site.
  • It is also possible that you only get to see ‘Access Denied’ instead of full 403 Forbidden status.
  • You may also see ‘Access to yourdomain.com was denied. You don’t have authorization to view this page.’

Now that you know about the different types of 403 errors, let’s talk about what causes this error.

What Causes 403 Forbidden Error in WordPress?

The most common cause for the 403 Forbidden error in WordPress is due to poorly configured security plugins. Many WordPress security plugins can block an IP address (or a whole range of IP addresses) if they believe them to be malicious.

This is why we use Sucuri to improve security of all our WordPress sites.

Another possible cause could be a corrupt .htaccess file or incorrect file permissions on your server.

Your WordPress hosting company can sometimes make accidental changes to their server settings. This may result in 403 Forbidden error on your site.

Having said that, let’s take a look at how to solve 403 forbidden error in WordPress.

For the full story and video “How To” click below:

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WPBeginner – 22 Mar 16

How to Fix the 403 Forbidden Error in WordPress

Seeing the 403 Forbidden error in WordPress? Follow our step-by-step guide on how to easily fix the 403 Forbidden error in WordPress to access your web pages.

Est. reading time: 6 minutes