Resolve Jetpack Errors

Jetpack is a powerful plugin that adds essential features to plugin-enabled sites on WordPress.com. While errors are rare, this guide will cover common issues you may encounter with Jetpack and how to resolve them.

In many cases, Jetpack will self-heal and resolve an issue without manual intervention, but you may continue to see the error after Jetpack has already self-healed.

Your first step should be to take the standard steps to clear any browser or network-related issues:

• Force Refresh
• Clear Your Browser Cache
• Clear WordPress.com Cookies
• Log out of WordPress.com and back in again.
• Further Troubleshooting, such as trying another browser, device, or network

After ruling out browser and network issues, you can move on to the following sections detailing common Jetpack errors.

Error Message: We can’t communicate with your site because the Jetpack plugin is deactivated.

Error Message: Jetpack can’t communicate with your site because your site isn’t connected.

Plugin-enabled sites hosted on WordPress.com must have Jetpack enabled to function correctly. You cannot disconnect, disable, or deactivate Jetpack on WordPress.com. In rare cases, migrating your site from another host may require that you restore or reconnect Jetpack after the migration is complete.

To reconnect Jetpack, follow these steps:

1. Visit your site’s dashboard.
2. Visit Jetpack → Dashboard.
3. Click either the “Restore Connection” or “Set up Jetpack” button to reconnect Jetpack to your site.

If you do not see a “Restore Connection” or “Setup Jetpack” message and you are not experiencing any other issues with your WordPress.com dashboard, you will want to go through the suggestions in the Basic Jetpack Troubleshooting section of this guide. This usually means Jetpack has already self-healed, but your browser has cached the error message.

In most cases, the following errors indicate that there is an issue with your custom domain:

Error Message: The URL stored by the Jetpack servers does not match your site.

Error Message: The Jetpack site is inaccessible or returned an error: transport error - HTTP status code was not 200.

Error Message: Jetpack is unable to connect to your domain because your domain’s DNS records aren’t pointing to your site.

SSL: no alternative certificate subject name matches target host name

If you’re seeing errors related to URL, inaccessible, DNS, or SSL, your custom domain is not ready to be used on your site yet. You can make Jetpack operational by temporarily using the default site address as your site’s primary domain.

Follow these steps to make the default site address primary until your domain is ready to use:

Select your admin interface:

You can continue working on your website content and design under this address. Once your domain becomes fully active, you can set it as the primary address.

Learn more about troubleshooting domain errors.

In most cases, the following errors indicate that there is a plugin or theme conflict on your site:

Error Message: Jetpack can’t communicate with your site due to a critical error on the site.

Error Message: Jetpack can’t communicate with your site because your site isn’t responding to requests.

Error Message: Jetpack can’t communicate with your site because XML-RPC is not responding correctly. 

Error Message: Jetpack can’t communicate with your site because the REST API is not responding correctly.

To identify and resolve errors caused by a plugin or theme conflict, follow these steps:

1. Check the email address associated with your account for messages from WordPress.com regarding the error. The email should include additional information about the plugin or theme causing the error.
2. Visit Plugins → Installed Plugins to deactivate the plugin, or Appearance → Themes to switch to a different theme.

If you did not receive an email, or the email didn’t specify which plugin or theme is causing the issue, you can follow these steps to identify where the conflict is:

1. Switch to a default WordPress theme, such as Twenty Twenty, to see if the issue persists.
   • If the issue goes away, your theme is causing the issue. You can: a) change your theme; b) contact the theme’s author and ask them to fix the issue.
   • If the issue doesn’t go away, proceed to the next step.
2. Go to Plugins → Installed Plugins and temporarily deactivate all plugins from your website (except for Akismet and Jetpack, which are automatically managed for you and unlikely to be the cause of the issue.)
3. Check if the error still appears. If the issue is no longer present, the plugin(s) you deactivated was causing the conflict.
4. Now, determine which plugin is causing the conflict by reactivating your plugins one by one and checking after each one is reactivated. Once the error returns, you’ll know that the plugin you just reactivated is the one causing the issue.

Learn more about solving problems with plugins.

If you have gone through the steps to identify plugin/theme conflicts and you are not experiencing any other issues with your WordPress.com dashboard, you will want to go through the suggestions in the Basic Jetpack Troubleshooting section of this guide. This usually means Jetpack has already self-healed, but your browser has cached the error message.

Contact us if you cannot access your WordPress.com dashboard to deactivate the theme or plugin.

Error Message: The site you have requested is not installed.
Run `wp core install` to create database tables.

This error can occur if your default table prefix, defined in your wp-config.php, does not match the existing prefix or your site is missing its wp_options table.

If the issue is the table prefix and you have SSH or SFTP access established, you can update the prefix to the correct one by updating your wp-config.php file. The default prefix is wp_. You can confirm the actual prefix in use with SSH access with this command wp db query “SHOW TABLES;”

If the issue is a missing table, you can import a backed-up version of this table (if you have access to one) via SSH access and the use of WP-CLI commands.

Contact us if you need assistance confirming your database prefix or restoring working tables to your site.

Sometimes, problems with the Jetpack connection can show a message like “You haven’t published any pages” in the Default Admin dashboard. The content may still be available in the WP Admin dashboard, but the Pages and Posts sections in the default admin dashboard may show an empty screen.

If you notice your blog posts and pages list is blank in the Default Admin, clear your site’s cache, troubleshoot your site’s plugins, and check for any Jetpack connection problems.

If this doesn’t resolve the problem, contact us.

If you have tried all of the steps to troubleshoot your Jetpack connection but cannot complete any because you can’t access the site dashboard, you will need to contact our Happiness Engineers to resolve the issue.

How to Contact Support:

1. Log into your WordPress.com account.
2. Click the question mark icon at the top right to open the Help Center.
3. Click “Still Need Help” in the pop-up window.
4. Type “Connect me to a human” in the chat window.
5. Click the “Contact WordPress.com Support” option.
6. Provide the following information:
   • The exact text of the error you’re seeing.
   • Actions you took before the error appeared.
   • Include which plugins or themes you have installed most recently.
   • If you uploaded anything to your site before this error appeared.