Understanding and Using the WordPress Tools Guide

The WordPress Tools available are invaluable, especially if you are moving content from another blog platform.

You can use the WordPress tools to:

import and export content
check the status of your WordPress site.
export or erase personal data

All the amazing tools you need to know to run a WordPress site!

Available Tools

Under the Available Tools setting, you will see a block for the Categories and Tag Converter.

In older versions of WordPress, this is the area where you could convert categories to tags or tags to categories.

This option has since been moved to the Import settings screen because it’s normally only an issue when importing content from other blog platforms.

Import

If you have content on other blogging platforms or other WordPress sites, you can easily copy that content to your WordPress site.

By default, WordPress displays options for importing content from Blogger, Live Journal, MoveableType, Type Pad, Tumblr, and WordPress.

There are also options for importing content from an RSS feed and the Categories and Tags Converters mentioned in the Available Tools section.

If the platform you need to import content from is not listed, search the WordPress plugin repository to see if there is a plugin available to import the content. Most likely, there is.

To import content from a blogging platform:

Click on the Install Now link under its name. This will install the plugin needed to perform the import.
The Install Now link will now turn into a Run Importer link.
Click that link to start the process of importing your content.

Export

Need to move your content to another site? The WordPress Export tool will export either all your content (posts, pages, comments, custom fields, terms, menus, and custom posts) into an XML file that you can then use to import on another site. If you do not wish to export all your content, you can specify just posts, pages, or media (images).

Site Health

The Site Health tool is relativity new to WordPress, just introduced in WordPress 5.2. WordPress will automatically run a series of tests on your site when you click over to the Site Health tool. The results from these tests are categorized as critical, recommended, or good. You can click on each result to get more information about it and the result.

On the Site Health tool page, there is also a tab at the top named Info that can show you every detail about your WordPress website configuration. This is handy for troubleshooting problems, and you can easily copy this information to the clipboard with a simple click of a button.

Export Personal Data

With new privacy laws coming into play constantly, WordPress developed a tool that will allow you to export a user’s personal data. The user has to have an account on your site and export information about the WordPress site, the user information, comments, and media.

To perform personal data export:

Enter a username or email address in the Export Request box (you have to be signed in as an administrator to do this)
Click on the Send Request button.

This will send the user an email confirming the export of the data.
Once you get the user to confirm the data export request, their information will appear as a Requester on the same settings page. At this point, a new button named “Email Data” will appear under the Next Steps column.

Just click this button to send the user the data.

Erase Personal Data

Erase Personal Data works almost exactly like the Export Personal Data feature listed above. The only difference is that once the user has confirmed the data deletion via email, the button in the Next Step column will be “Remove Request.” Once you click the Remove Request button, all the user’s personal data will be removed.

So, those are your WordPress tools!

I have to admit, and they do come in handy. My favorite so far is the Export function; I’ve used this several times to move posts and images from one WordPress site to another with ease. Don’t be afraid to use them when needed. Just be sure to make a backup of your site before using any of the tools.