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WordPress How to Install WordPress on Your Computer How to Install WordPress on Your Computer Introduction to Local WordPress Development

I am wondering why you would want to use a local development over a live development for wordpress?

Why would use a WordPress Local development over a WordPress Live?

The first thing that comes to mind is you have the ability to edit your WordPress site without an internet connection locally.

Another reason would be if it's something like a full site re-vamp or a complex project that would take some time to do, you wouldn't want just pieces of your site being updated at a time. You'd want to do it all locally and then upload it all after you're finished.

There might be more reasons than just those. But off the top of my head, that's what I came up with

I think the advantage is you can play around with the files without affecting the site. Also, if you remove/change the code and it causes and error, it's not live so the site is safe while you fix the mistake.

Agree with Paul that you don't need and internet connection.

1 Answer

Sue Dough
Sue Dough
35,800 Points

Many reasons:

Security - you may code some insecure code while testing

Privacy - peace of mind when coding something new

Faster development - since I don't have to push servers from local to host every save!!!

Data integrity - There may be times where you need to test with real user data. An example of when this goes wrong is a site Patreon left their development server out in the live vs local and it exposed all their customers data which lost their company a lot of trust. If your testing with users real data, that is no joke and you have a responsiblity to keep it safe.

cost - Why pay for another server if you dont have to

speed - local host can be very fast since the server is where the client is

wifi not required - Does not need wifi