website and dashboard blank white page after WordPress Update

Help... Using wordpress I noticed it stated I had an update. Tried the update and after it was done, website is now a blank white page and the wordpress dashboard will let me log in (website address/wp-admin) but only displays a blank white page after entering my username/email and password as well.

It will not let me in to restore, edit, or change anything on the WP Dashboard.
It could be that something broke during the upgrade and your website code is crashing now. Could you check if there is any error output from WordPress?

https://infinityfree.net/support/http-error-500/
https://codex.wordpress.org/Debugging_in_WordPress#WP_DEBUG

How do I tell? Web browser is blank white with my site address (Jacksonarc.com) in the address bar.

Hi
that is called white screen of death (error 500)

if you open browser dev. tools (F12) and look at console (refresh)
you will see error 500

try disable plugins or themes
please use FTP and temporarily rename folders plugins and themes (add X at the end)
then try to enter the dashboard
and then return the folder names and move the problematic plugins



FTP? What is that and I pray it isn’t something I have to download to PC because my computer is JUNK and can’t download any software to it.

I think I found in control panel a free software for FTP. I’ll see if my PC will allow me to install it just for this. Hope it works

It let me download and install FTP software thankfully… However, if I am doing this correctly, “Download” Plugin and themes folder, change the name (Adding “X” to the end of it) using the FTP software and then re-upload it…

If this is the way to do it, I am getting an error and it will not let me download those folders…

OxyDac said:
Hi
that is called white screen of death (error 500)

if you open browser dev. tools (F12) and look at console (refresh)
you will see error 500

try disable plugins or themes
please use FTP and temporarily rename folders plugins and themes (add X at the end)
then try to enter the dashboard
and then return the folder names and move the problematic plugins



How do I know what plugins was "Problematic"? It was Wordpress itself that I tried to update. I believe it was 5.0.3 or something like that...

no installation - you use an online FTP client from the client area (monstaFTP)

if you did not have any plugin or theme on that wordpress before you update it

then it makes no sense to rename…

but if you had them
my assumption is that some of them are not compatible with the newer version of WP and it creates a problem…

I just guess because I have no insight into your files
but why
you do not do it as admin has suggested (error 500 link, etc)

There is one thing I forgot to say.

The first thing you should do is to open the Network tab in your browser's development tools and reload the page. Does it say status code 500? Then the code is crashing, and you could follow the links I posted earlier.

Does it say status code 200? That's a particular issue with WordPress that your website is configured to use a certain theme, but the theme files are missing. If that's the case, you could do the following:
  1. Open your website in a file manager and check the wp-contents/themes/ folder of your website. There should be at least one theme folder there, preferably the one of the theme you were using on your site.
  2. Go to the control panel, go to phpMyAdmin and open the database used by WordPress. In the wp_contents table, there is a row where option_name = template. This value should match the folder name of the theme you just saw. If it doesn't, you can edit the value to match the theme name.

Right clicking on jacksonarc.com, going to inspect element, then network, I am seeing 500, a 302, and a few 200 messages.

I was wondering, since I had a plugin for backing up wordpress before even starting the update. If I remove wordpress, then re-add wordpress from scratch (as starting over), if I install that plugin, would it restore my website to the way it was before the update?

If so, what are the steps to remove wordpress all together, and then re-adding it back?

I was able to fix the issue with ease… Went into control panel, softaculous, my installations, and was able to update wordpress from there, and it fixed the problem. Seems my site is back up, and I am now able to log into Dashboard.

Thank you all for your assistance…