Applicable to:
- Plesk Onyx
Question
How to set up a multisite WordPress network ?
Answer
Note: It is always recommended to set up a network on a fresh WordPress deployment, since enabling multisite on a production website might cause some problems.
Step 1. Start by creating a new webspace for Power User view and subscription for Service Provider View (e.g. multisite.com) in Plesk and installing WordPress on it:
Power User View:
Service Provider View:
Step 2. Login to WordPress as admin, go to Tools > Network Setup . Configure the network to have sites on separate sub-domains. Follow the instructions and update wp-config.php and .htaccess.
Note: If FPM by nginx is set as PHP handler or website uses nginx only configuration use the following article to add addtional nginx directives:
What are nginx rewrite rules for WordPress multisite?
After that, you'll need to re-login to WordPress as admin.
Step 3 . Go to My Sites > Network Admin > Sites and create additional sites in your WordPress network. For example:
- multisite-net.multisite.com
- multisite-org.multisite.com
- multisite-us.multisite.com
Don't be confused by the fact, that you're configuring them as subdomains - you'll remap them later. Remember their IDs (can be seen in the URL when you hover your mouse over the site name) - you'll need them for mapping.
Step 4. Install the WordPress MU Domain Mapping plugin if it is not installed and configure it according to the instructions .
Step 5. Go to Settings > Domains and define domain-site mappings, using site IDs and domain names you'll be using. For example:
2 - multisite.net
3 - multisite.org
4 - multisite.us
Leave Primary checkbox selected, otherwise WordPress will redirect visitors from a domain to the subdomain it is mapped to.
At this point, multisite set up on the WordPress side is complete. Now, it is time to create these additional websites on the Plesk side. There are three ways to do this:
- Create domain aliases for the main website on the webspace (in our example, aliases multisite.net, multisite.org, and multisite.us for the website multisite.com). This is the easiest way to do this. However, to protect such additional sites with an SSL certificate, you must have multi-domain SSL certificate installed on the main website (Note: Let's Encrypt extension allows creating such certificates right from the Plesk interface).
- Create additional domains under current webspace/subscription and point their document root to the document root of the main website (i.e. /httpdocs). In this case, you'll have more flexibility in terms of website settings for every site and can purchase separate SSL certificate for each domain.
- Set the main website as default virtual host on the IP address . Go to Tools & Settings > IP addresses > <IP Address> and select your WordPress website as the default website for this IP address. You won't need to create any additional domains or aliases in Plesk - as long as other site names are resolving to the same IP address, web server will use your WordPress website as a default destination for any request that comes to this IP address. However SSL certificate for the main website must include all domains you're planning to add to your multisite network.
You can mix-and-match these approaches - all of them will work together.
At the end, you'll have several websites, each with their own domain name, which use single WordPress installation, but show different content.
Important!
Plesk WordPress Toolkit extension treats multisite installations as a typical single-site deployment. Specifically:
- WordPress Toolkit will display WordPress installation, plugins, and themes on the main website of the network only.
- Plugins and themes installed via WordPress Toolkit must be “network activated” from WordPress admin dashboard.
Comments
5 comments
Great guide thank you and it almost worked perfectly. For my situation it required using 3. (Set the main website as default virtual host on the IP address) but then I also needed to create a wildcard webspace to get this to work. The wildcard webspace matches the wildcard CName record I created with my DNS manager. (Just sharing in case it helps anyone else)
A couple of things if you please. We just stood up up two new 17.8 Onyx boxes - pretty much done, pushing a new sites now.
One brand new wordpress install - went through config and htaccess steps to set it up multisite - that's working as I can see the tables being added when I add a site / make mods, have the users / themes / settings tabs all appearing fine under the subsites. I can sometime get to their dashboards, sometimes not and when going to a subsite url, the main site appears.
1) I don't see the top panel in your example, esp. "Webspaces" - and I cannot get the subsites to function correctly as separate domains per your instructions (domainA.com - domainB.com). I have the main site just setup as a simple domain, set as the default site on a shared IP - but it was setup as a domain and NOT a webspace (again, I'm not seeing that in 17.8.) I'm on Ubuntu 16.04 if that matters.
Could not having this setup initially as a WEBSPACE be part of the issue? Do I need to setup AllowOverride All for the directory in our Apache configs or something?... I had a multisite working on Plesk 12.5 ok but have spent hours on this puppy to no avail.
Hi there,
This document has been altered to allow for WP 4.5+ installs. However you state "Don't be confused by the fact, that you're configuring them as subdomains - you'll remap them later" Where do we do this now? Originally I would use the WordPress MU Domain Mapping plugin. Thanks in advance.
@webmaster
Most probably the root cause of the issue is that you are using Service Provider View. In this view there are no such items like Webspace. There are Subscriptions instead.
And when you created additional domains I suppose they were created in separate subscriptions.
In this case, you should create additional domains under one subscription. For example:
1. Create a subscription example.com in Plesk
2. Go to Subscriptions > example.com
3. Add the domains(i.e. example.net, example.org, etc.) under this subscription by clicking Add Domain button
I have modified the article to make it clearer. Thank you for your feedback.
@Jan van der Mei
I have checked this in test environment.
Indeed, Domain mapping tool is not included in Wordpress version 4.9.8. It is necessary to install the WordPress MU Domain Mapping plugin.
The article has been modified.
Thank you for pointing this out.
Please sign in to leave a comment.