July 16, 2024

W3 Total Cache Plugin

Search Engine (SEO) & Performance Optimization (WPO) via caching. Integrated caching: CDN, Page, Minify, Object, Fragment, Database support.

W3 Total Cache (W3TC) improves the SEO, Core Web Vitals and overall user experience of your site by increasing website performance and reducing load times by leveraging features like content delivery network (CDN) integration and the latest best practices.

W3TC is the only web host agnostic Web Performance Optimization (WPO) framework for WordPress trusted by millions of publishers, web developers, and web hosts worldwide for more than a decade. It is the total performance solution for optimizing WordPress Websites.

BENEFITS

Improvements in search engine result page rankings, especially for mobile-friendly websites and sites that use SSL
At least 10x improvement in overall site performance (Grade A in WebPagetest or significant Google PageSpeed improvements) when fully configured
Improved conversion rates and “site performance” which affect your site’s rank on Google.com
“Instant” repeat page views: browser caching
Optimized progressive render: pages start rendering quickly and can be interacted with more quickly
Reduced page load time: increased visitor time on site; visitors view more pages
Improved web server performance; sustain high traffic periods
Up to 80% bandwidth savings when you minify HTML, minify CSS and minify JS files.

KEY FEATURES

Compatible with shared hosting, virtual private / dedicated servers and dedicated servers / clusters
Transparent content delivery network (CDN) management with Media Library, theme files and WordPress itself
Mobile support: respective caching of pages by referrer or groups of user agents including theme switching for groups of referrers or user agents
Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) support
Secure Socket Layer (SSL/TLS) support
Caching of (minified and compressed) pages and posts in memory or on disk or on (FSD) CDN (by user agent group)
Caching of (minified and compressed) CSS and JavaScript in memory, on disk or on CDN
Caching of feeds (site, categories, tags, comments, search results) in memory or on disk or on CDN
Caching of search results pages (i.e. URIs with query string variables) in memory or on disk
Caching of database objects in memory or on disk
Caching of objects in memory or on disk
Caching of fragments in memory or on disk
Caching methods include local Disk, Redis, Memcached, APC, APCu, eAccelerator, XCache, and WinCache
Minify CSS, Minify JavaScript and Minify HTML with granular control
Minification of posts and pages and RSS feeds
Minification of inline, embedded or 3rd party JavaScript with automated updates to assets
Minification of inline, embedded or 3rd party CSS with automated updates to assets
Defer non critical CSS and Javascript for rendering pages faster than ever before
Defer offscreen images using Lazy Load to improve the user experience
Browser caching using cache-control, future expire headers and entity tags (ETag) with “cache-busting”
JavaScript grouping by template (home page, post page etc) with embed location control
Non-blocking JavaScript embedding
Import post attachments directly into the Media Library (and CDN)
Leverage our multiple CDN integrations to optimize images
WP-CLI support for cache purging, query string updating and more
Various security features to help ensure website safety
Caching statistics for performance insights of any enabled feature
Extension framework for customization or extensibility for Cloudflare, WPML and much more
Reverse proxy integration via Nginx or Varnish
WebP Converter extension provides WebP image format conversion from common image formats (on upload and on demand)

Speed up your site tremendously, improve core web vitals and the overall user experience for your visitors without having to change your WordPress host, theme, plugins or your content production workflow.

What users have to say:

Read testimonials from W3TC users.

Who do I thank for all of this?

It’s quite difficult to recall all of the innovators that have shared their thoughts, code and experiences in the blogosphere over the years, but here are some names to get you started:

Please reach out to all of these people and support their projects if you’re so inclined.

Installation

Deactivate and uninstall any other caching plugin you may be using. Pay special attention if you have customized the rewrite rules for fancy permalinks, have previously installed a caching plugin or have any browser caching rules as W3TC will automate management of all best practices. Also make sure wp-content/ and wp-content/uploads/ (temporarily) have 777 permissions before proceeding, e.g. in the terminal: # chmod 777 /var/www/vhosts/domain.com/httpdocs/wp-content/ using your web hosting control panel or your FTP / SSH account.
Login as an administrator to your WordPress Admin account. Using the “Add New” menu option under the “Plugins” section of the navigation, you can either search for: w3 total cache or if you’ve downloaded the plugin already, click the “Upload” link, find the .zip file you download and then click “Install Now”. Or you can unzip and FTP upload the plugin to your plugins directory (wp-content/plugins/). In either case, when done wp-content/plugins/w3-total-cache/ should exist.
Locate and activate the plugin on the “Plugins” page. Page caching will automatically be running in basic mode. Set the permissions of wp-content and wp-content/uploads back to 755, e.g. in the terminal: # chmod 755 /var/www/vhosts/domain.com/httpdocs/wp-content/.
Now click the “Settings” link to proceed to the “General Settings” tab; in most cases, “disk enhanced” mode for page cache is a “good” starting point.
The “Compatibility mode” option found in the advanced section of the “Page Cache Settings” tab will enable functionality that optimizes the interoperablity of caching with WordPress, is disabled by default, but highly recommended. Years of testing in hundreds of thousands of installations have helped us learn how to make caching behave well with WordPress. The tradeoff is that disk enhanced page cache performance under load tests will be decreased by ~20% at scale.
Recommended: On the “Minify Settings” tab, all of the recommended settings are preset. If auto mode causes issues with your web site’s layout, switch to manual mode and use the help button to simplify discovery of your CSS and JS files and groups. Pay close attention to the method and location of your JS group embeddings. See the plugin’s FAQ for more information on usage.
Recommended: On the “Browser Cache” tab, HTTP compression is enabled by default. Make sure to enable other options to suit your goals.
Recommended: If you already have a content delivery network (CDN) provider, proceed to the “Content Delivery Network” tab and populate the fields and set your preferences. If you do not use the Media Library, you will need to import your images etc into the default locations. Use the Media Library Import Tool on the “Content Delivery Network” tab to perform this task. If you do not have a CDN provider, you can still improve your site’s performance using the “Self-hosted” method. On your own server, create a subdomain and matching DNS Zone record; e.g. static.domain.com and configure FTP options on the “Content Delivery Network” tab accordingly. Be sure to FTP upload the appropriate files, using the available upload buttons.
Optional: On the “Database Cache” tab, the recommended settings are preset. If using a shared hosting account use the “disk” method with caution, the response time of the disk may not be fast enough, so this option is disabled by default. Try object caching instead for shared hosting.
Optional: On the “Object Cache” tab, all of the recommended settings are preset. If using a shared hosting account use the “disk” method with caution, the response time of the disk may not be fast enough, so this option is disabled by default. Test this option with and without database cache to ensure that it provides a performance increase.
Optional: On the “User Agent Groups” tab, specify any user agents, like mobile phones if a mobile theme is used.

FAQ

Why does speed matter?

Search engines like Google, measure and factor in the speed of web sites in their ranking algorithm. When they recommend a site they want to make sure users find what they’re looking for quickly. So in effect you and Google should have the same objective.

Speed is among the most significant success factors web sites face. In fact, your site’s speed directly affects your income (revenue) — it’s a fact. Some high traffic sites conducted research and uncovered the following:

Google.com: +500 ms (speed decrease) -> -20% traffic loss [1]
Yahoo.com: +400 ms (speed decrease) -> -5-9% full-page traffic loss (visitor left before the page finished loading) [2]
Amazon.com: +100 ms (speed decrease) -> -1% sales loss [1]

A thousandth of a second is not a long time, yet the impact is quite significant. Even if you’re not a large company (or just hope to become one), a loss is still a loss. W3 Total Cache is your solution for faster websites, happier visitors and better results.

Many of the other consequences of poor performance were discovered more than a decade ago:

Lower perceived credibility (Fogg et al. 2001)
Lower perceived quality (Bouch, Kuchinsky, and Bhatti 2000)
Increased user frustration (Ceaparu et al. 2004)
Increased blood pressure (Scheirer et al. 2002)
Reduced flow rates (Novak, Hoffman, and Yung 200)
Reduced conversion rates (Akamai 2007)
Increased exit rates (Nielsen 2000)
Are perceived as less interesting (Ramsay, Barbesi, and Preece 1998)
Are perceived as less attractive (Skadberg and Kimmel 2004)

There are a number of resources that have been documenting the role of performance in success on the web, W3 Total Cache exists to give you a framework to tune your application or site without having to do years of research.

Why is W3 Total Cache better than other caching solutions?

It’s a complete framework. Most cache plugins available do a great job at achieving a couple of performance gains. Total Cache is different because it remedies numerous performance reducing aspects of any web site. It goes farther than the basics, beyond merely reducing CPU usage (load) or bandwidth consumption for HTML pages. Equally important, the plugin requires no theme modifications, modifications to your .htaccess (mod_rewrite rules) or programming compromises to get started. Most importantly, it’s the only plugin designed to optimize all practical hosting environments small or large. The options are many and setup is easy.

I’ve never heard of any of this stuff; my site is fine, no one complains about the speed. Why should I install this?

Rarely do readers take the time to complain. They typically just stop browsing earlier than you’d prefer and may not return altogether. This is the only plugin specifically designed to make sure that all aspects of your site are as fast as possible. Google is placing more emphasis on the speed of a site as a factor in rankings; this plugin helps with that too.

It’s in every web site owner’s best interest is to make sure that the performance of your site is not hindering its success.

Which WordPress versions are supported?

To use all features in the suite, a minimum of version WordPress 5.3 with PHP 7.2.5 is required. Earlier versions will benefit from our Media Library Importer to get them back on the upgrade path and into a CDN of their choosing.

Why doesn’t minify work for me?

Great question. W3 Total Cache uses several open source tools to attempt to combine and optimize CSS, JavaScript and HTML etc. Unfortunately some trial and error is required on the part of developers is required to make sure that their code can be successfully minified with the various libraries W3 Total Cache supports. Even still, if developers do test their code thoroughly, they cannot be sure that interoperability with other code your site may have. This fault does not lie with any single party here, because there are thousands of plugins and theme combinations that a given site can have, there are millions of possible combinations of CSS, JavaScript etc.

A good rule of thumb is to try auto mode, work with a developer to identify the code that is not compatible and start with combine only mode (the safest optimization) and increase the optimization to the point just before functionality (JavaScript) or user interface / layout (CSS) breaks in your site.

We’re always working to make this more simple and straight forward in future releases, but this is not an undertaking we can realize on our own. When you find a plugin, theme or file that is not compatible with minification reach out to the developer and ask them either to provide a minified version with their distribution or otherwise make sure their code is minification-friendly.

What about comments? Does the plugin slow down the rate at which comments appear?

On the contrary, as with any other action a user can perform on a site, faster performance will encourage more of it. The cache is so quickly rebuilt in memory that it’s no trouble to show visitors the most current version of a post that’s experiencing Digg, Slashdot, Drudge Report, Yahoo Buzz or Twitter effect.

Will the plugin interfere with other plugins or widgets?

No, on the contrary if you use the minify settings you will improve their performance by several times.

Does this plugin work with WordPress in network mode?

Indeed it does.

Does this plugin work with BuddyPress (bbPress)?

Yes.

Will this plugin speed up WP Admin?

Yes, indirectly – if you have a lot of bloggers working with you, you will find that it feels like you have a server dedicated only to WP Admin once this plugin is enabled; the result, increased productivity.

Which web servers do you support?

We are aware of no incompatibilities with apache 1.3+, nginx 0.7+, IIS 5+ or litespeed 4.0.2+. If there’s a web server you feel we should be actively testing (e.g. lighttpd), we’re interested in hearing.

Is this plugin server cluster and load balancer friendly?

Yes, built from the ground up with scale and current hosting paradigms in mind.

What is the purpose of the “Media Library Import” tool and how do I use it?

The media library import tool is for old or “messy” WordPress installations that have attachments (images etc in posts or pages) scattered about the web server or “hot linked” to 3rd party sites instead of properly using the media library.

The tool will scan your posts and pages for the cases above and copy them to your media library, update your posts to use the link addresses and produce a .htaccess file containing the list of of permanent redirects, so search engines can find the files in their new location.

You should backup your database before performing this operation.

How do I find the JS and CSS to optimize (minify) them with this plugin?

Use the “Help” button available on the Minify settings tab. Once open, the tool will look for and populate the CSS and JS files used in each template of the site for the active theme. To then add a file to the minify settings, click the checkbox next to that file. The embed location of JS files can also be specified to improve page render performance. Minify settings for all installed themes can be managed from the tool as well by selecting the theme from the drop down menu. Once done configuring minify settings, click the apply and close button, then save settings in the Minify settings tab.

I don’t understand what a CDN has to do with caching, that’s completely different, no?

Technically no, a CDN is a high performance cache that stores static assets (your theme files, media library etc) in various locations throughout the world in order to provide low latency access to them by readers in those regions. Use Total Cache to accelerate your site by putting your content closer to your users with our many CDN integrations including Cloudflare, StackPath, AWS and more.

How do I use an Origin Pull (Mirror) CDN?

Login to your CDN providers control panel or account management area. Following any set up steps they provide, create a new “pull zone” or “bucket” for your site’s domain name. If there’s a set up wizard or any troubleshooting tips your provider offers, be sure to review them. In the CDN tab of the plugin, enter the hostname your CDN provider provided in the “replace site’s hostname with” field. You should always do a quick check by opening a test file from the CDN hostname, e.g. http://cdn.domain.com/favicon.ico. Troubleshoot with your CDN provider until this test is successful.

Now go to the General tab and click the checkbox and save the settings to enable CDN functionality and empty the cache for the changes to take effect.

How do I configure Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) or Amazon CloudFront as my CDN?

First create an S3 account (unless using origin pull); it may take several hours for your account credentials to be functional. Next, you need to obtain your “Access key ID” and “Secret key” from the “Access Credentials” section of the “Security Credentials” page of “My Account.” Make sure the status is “active.” Next, make sure that “Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3)” is the selected “CDN type” on the “General Settings” tab, then save the changes. Now on the “Content Delivery Network Settings” tab enter your “Access key,” “Secret key” and enter a name (avoid special characters and spaces) for your bucket in the “Create a bucket” field by clicking the button of the same name. If using an existing bucket simply specify the bucket name in the “Bucket” field. Click the “Test S3 Upload” button and make sure that the test is successful, if not check your settings and try again. Save your settings.

Unless you wish to use CloudFront, you’re almost done, skip to the next paragraph if you’re using CloudFront. Go to the “General Settings” tab and click the “Enable” checkbox and save the settings to enable CDN functionality. Empty the cache for the changes to take effect. If preview mode is active you will need to “deploy” your changes for them to take effect.

To use CloudFront, perform all of the steps above, except select the “Amazon CloudFront” “CDN type” in the “Content Delivery Network” section of the “General Settings” tab. When creating a new bucket, the distribution ID will automatically be populated. Otherwise, proceed to the AWS Management Console and create a new distribution: select the S3 Bucket you created earlier as the “Origin,” enter a CNAME if you wish to add one or more to your DNS Zone. Make sure that “Distribution Status” is enabled and “State” is deployed. Now on “Content Delivery Network” tab of the plugin, copy the subdomain found in the AWS Management Console and enter the CNAME used for the distribution in the “CNAME” field.

You may optionally, specify up to 10 hostnames to use rather than the default hostname, doing so will improve the render performance of your site’s pages. Additional hostnames should also be specified in the settings for the distribution you’re using in the AWS Management Console.

Now go to the General tab and click the “Enable” checkbox and save the settings to enable CDN functionality and empty the cache for the changes to take effect. If preview mode is active you will need to “deploy” your changes for them to take effect.

How do I configure Rackspace Cloud Files as my CDN?

First create an account. Next, in the “Content Delivery Network” section of the “General Settings” tab, select Rackspace Cloud Files as the “CDN Type.” Now, in the “Configuration” section of the “Content Delivery Network” tab, enter the “Username” and “API key” associated with your account (found in the API Access section of the rackspace cloud control panel) in the respective fields. Next enter a name for the container to use (avoid special characters and spaces). If the operation is successful, the container’s ID will automatically appear in the “Replace site’s hostname with” field. You may optionally, specify the container name and container ID of an existing container if you wish. Click the “Test Cloud Files Upload” button and make sure that the test is successful, if not check your settings and try again. Save your settings. You’re now ready to export your media library, theme and any other files to the CDN.

You may optionally, specify up to 10 hostnames to use rather than the default hostname, doing so will improve the render performance of your site’s pages.

What is the purpose of the “modify attachment URLs” button?

If the domain name of your site has changed, this tool is useful in updating your posts and pages to use the current addresses. For example, if your site used to be www.domain.com, and you decided to change it to domain.com, the result would either be many “broken” images or many unnecessary redirects (which slow down the visitor’s browsing experience). You can use this tool to correct this and similar cases. Correcting the URLs of your images also allows the plugin to do a better job of determining which images are actually hosted with the CDN.

As always, it never hurts to back up your database first.

Is this plugin comptatible with TDO Mini Forms?

Captcha and recaptcha will work fine, however you will need to prevent any pages with forms from being cached. Add the page’s URI to the “Never cache the following pages” box on the Page Cache Settings tab.

Is this plugin comptatible with GD Star Rating?

Yes. Follow these steps:

Enable dynamic loading of ratings by checking GD Star Rating -> Settings -> Features “Cache support option”
If Database cache enabled in W3 Total Cache add wp_gdsr to “Ignored query stems” field in the Database Cache settings tab, otherwise ratings will not updated after voting
Empty all caches

I see garbage characters instead of the normal web site, what’s going on here?

If a theme or it’s files use the call php_flush() or function flush() that will interfere with the plugins normal operation; making the plugin send cached files before essential operations have finished. The flush() call is no longer necessary and should be removed.

How do I cache only the home page?

Add /.+ to page cache “Never cache the following pages” option on the page cache settings tab.

I’m getting blank pages or 500 error codes when trying to upgrade on WordPress in network mode

First, make sure the plugin is not active (disabled) network-wide. Then make sure it’s deactivated network-wide. Now you should be able to successful upgrade without breaking your site.

A notification about file owner appears along with an FTP form, how can I resolve this?

The plugin uses WordPress FileSystem functionality to write to files. It checks if the file owner, file owner group of created files match process owner. If this is not the case it cannot write or modify files.

Typically, you should tell your web host about the permission issue and they should be able to resolve it.

You can however try adding define(‘FS_METHOD’, ‘direct’); to wp-config.php to circumvent the file and folder checks.

Does the WebP Converter extension use a lot of resources to convert images to WebP?

No. The WebP Converter extension converts common image file formats to the modern WebP format using our API services. The conversions occur on our API service, so that resource usage does not impact your website server.

Is image data retained by the Total Cache WebP Converter API?

Image data received by our API is destroyed after a converted image is generated. The converted iamges are destroyed once picked-up/downloaded to your website by the Total Cache plugin.

This is too good to be true, how can I test the results?

You will be able to see the results instantly on each page load, but for tangible metrics, you should consider using the following tools:

I don’t have time to deal with this, but I know I need it. Will you help me?

Yes! Please reach out to us and we’ll get you acclimated so you can “set it and forget it.”

Install the plugin to read the full FAQ on the plugins FAQ tab.

Changelog

2.7.4

Fix: WP-CLI get option output for array type
Fix: Remove CSS/JS URL matching
Fix: Nginx rules for feature and permission policies
Fix: Redis connect port for unix sockets error
Update: Newsletter in footer is now a link to a working form
Update: Added JSON type for WP-CLI get/set option
Update: Added config export for WP-CLI
Update: Added content matching option for Remove CSS/JS individual entries
Update: Updated Google PageSpeed score block appearance for cleaner UI
Update: Added Google PageSpeed score block for PageCache Lazy Loading Google Maps setting
Update: Added Google PageSpeed score block for Minify Eliminate Render Blocking CSS option

2.7.3

Fix: Page Cache: File Cleaner now uses the correct expiration setting
Fix: PHP 8.1 warnings for Redis connect
Fix: Google ChartJS error
Update: Bumped PHP minimum version to 7.2.5; added support for up to PHP 8.3
Update: AWS SDK PHP dependency updated to 3.314.2
Update: Microsoft Azure Storage SDK PHP dependency updated to 1.5.4 (blob) and 1.5.2 (common)
Update: Several other PHP and NodeJS dependencies updated
Update: Made improvements to the Remove CSS/JS feature
Update: Removed the newsletter signup popup and added it in the footer
Update: Added use-case proof and links to settings pages
Update: Changed CDN default to none and updated the StackPath EOL notice

2.7.2

Fix: Page Cache cleanup purging all if browsercache.html.lifetime > W3TC_CACHE_FILE_EXPIRE_MAX
Fix: Page Cache primer: Ignore sitemap XML comments
Fix: Page Cache primer: Preload cache for custom post types
Fix: Page Cache primer: Add an option to prime cache after updating a post/page/CPT
Fix: Redis test logic
Fix: Cloudflare extension: Setting values via API
Fix: Amazon SNS message validation
Fix: Handle XML setting being saved properly
Update: Add more options to the Remove CSS/JS feature
Update: Add an option for Amazon CloudFront default region in distribution hostname
Update: Add information about feature impact on PageSpeed
Update: Reworked the Page Cache Preload settings UI

2.7.1

Fix: Page Cache: Prefer Brotli over Gzip
Fix: Page Cache: Purge sitemaps on post creation/edit/trash/delete
Fix: Page Cache: Processed content filter
Fix: Minify URL to filename filter mapping
Update: Added Bunny CDN partner information
Update: Added filters for Apache rules and Page Cache postfix

2.7.0

Feature: Performance Dashboard update
Feature: Remove unused CSS/JS
Fix: Nginx feature and permission policy header syntax
Fix: Memcache install check
Fix: CloudFront purge button
Fix: Uncaught type error on the install page
Fix: Page mapping data
Fix: Add missing id for a save settings button
Fix: Extension counts
Fix: PHP 8.2 deprecation warnings for dynamic class property assignments
Fix: Do not autoload WP option for PageSpeed data
Fix: Cache groups: Fix spacing in values for htaccess syntax
Fix: Refactor Minify cache key mapping to have shorter keys and separate storage
Fix: Minify statistics output and PHP warnings
Fix: Feature Showcase: New feature version numbers
Fix: Lazy Loading URL pattern match
Update: Upgrade modal/popup
Update: Added “Learn more” links

2.6.1

Fix: WebP Converter extension activation
Fix: Media Library upload may fail when using Bunny CDN
Fix: Cloudflare API error when updating certain settings
Fix: Lazy Loading issue with the Delay Scripts feature enabled
Update: Allow custom hostname changes for Bunny CDN

2.6.0

Feature: Added support for Bunny.Net CDN
Feature: Preload requests (Pro)
Fix: Error when changing CDN cookie domain setting
Fix: Admin notice when flushing cache from the admin bar
Fix: Error in some Minify cache file operations
Fix: PHP 8 compatibility
Update: Delay scripts UI changes

2.5.0

Feature: Added Delay Scripts (Pro)
Fix: Several PHP 8 warnings
Fix: Fragment Cache extension PHP warnings when no engine was selected
Fix: Fragment Cache engine selection disabled for pro license under certain conditions
Fix: Added Database Cluster compatibility for older db.php files
Fix: Fixed one PageSpeed tool metric not outputting data and adjusted a few labels
Fix: Multiple anchor links for PageSpeed block on General Settings page
Fix: Cache Groups validation on save
Fix: Cache Groups delete button not working for added groups
Update: Renamed Image Service feature to WebP Converter
Update: Added WebP Converter block to General Settings page along with link to navigation bar
Update: StackPath CDN prices (Service ending November 22, 2023 and will be replaced by Bunny CDN in future update)

2.4.1

Fix: Add a fallback for the older version of wp-content/db.php

2.4.0

Feature: Added filter “w3tc_config_item_objectcache.enabled” to allow for disabling W3TC object cache
Fix: Auto-apply W3TC Pro license after purchase via in-plugin purchase/upgrade buttons
Fix: PHP 8 warnings for Page and Fragment caches
Fix: Replaced delete_blog deprecated hook with wp_uninitialize_site and wp_update_site
Fix: Database Cluster configuration file save issue
Fix: Fragment cache will now be disabled for non-pro users instead of being only disabled on the front-end
Fix: Premium services widget list is now synced with the support page
Update: User interface updated for cleaner appearance and easier navigation and control
Update: Added support for get/set/add/delete wp_xxx_multiple methods to Object cache

2.3.3

Fix: Fragment Cache: Fatal error when displaying registered groups
Fix: PHP 8 deprecation warnings in the SNS Message Bus and NuSOAP libraries
Fix: Broken nonce for renewal form
Fix: Page Cache: Moved hardcoded query string exemptions to the settings page
Update: Redis and Memcached host/IP/domain configuration examples

2.3.2

Fix: Correct interpolation of a symlinked cache directory
Fix: Memcached test using SASL authentication
Fix: Multi-site authorization request returning to incorrect URL

2.3.1

Fix: PHP 8 compatibility: Invalid return type if Browser Cache is disabled
Fix: Added AWS SNS message classes (aws/aws-php-sns-message-validator)
Fix: PageSpeed service: messages and escaping
Fix: Image Service meta query handling
Update: Dependency version updates
Update: Content-Security-Policy (CSP) and Content-Security-Policy-Report-Only (CSPRO) header field configuration

2.3.0

Feature: PageSpeed Insights reports and performance page widget
Feature: Added basic OpenLiteSpeed support
Feature: Add Permissions-Policy to mirror Feature-Policy directives
Fix: PHP 8.2 compatibility
Fix: GuzzleHttp 7 conflict with Azure
Fix: Allow object cache updates when using WP-CLI
Fix: Added missing Page Cache configuration “host” value
Fix: Missing on_comment_status action callback
Fix: Flush cache on attachment update
Fix: Varnish flush for posts
Update: Improved comment status logic for flushing database and object caches
Update: Adjusted FTP form style
Update: Removed deprecated MaxCDN and NetDNA components and added a notice if one was used
Update: Removed deprecated FeedBurner

2.2.12

Fix: Comment status change error
Fix: Varnish flush post arguments

2.2.11

Fix: Error when flushing page cache after an attachment update

2.2.10

Fix: Optimized and fixed object cache flushing
Fix: Scheduled post page cache flushing
Fix: Admin bar flush cache for current page with disabled purge policy
Fix: Loop when disabling Minify HTTP/2 push setting
Fix: Extension admin notice missing links
Update: Removed custom translation files

2.2.9

Fix: Reset our textdomain for translations

2.2.8

Fix: Escape output in compatibility checker, minify, and New Relic pages
Fix: Admin notice buttons on non-plugin pages
Fix: Namespace on exception type in a minify class
Fix: Translation issues due to hooks and typos
Fix: Broken JavaScript in admin_print_scripts calls when language is not English
Fix: Deprecated warnings in JS and CSS minify
Update: Translation files

2.2.7

Fix: Updated database cache connection class to avoid deprecated warnings in WordPress 6.1
Fix: Redis: Fixed handling of retry interval and timeout options for usage statistics
Enhancement: Redis: Added TLS/SSL certificate verification option
Enhancement: Page cache: Added query string exemptions

2.2.6

Fix: Error clearing all cache when using CloudFront full CDN in Pro

2.2.5

Fix: Revert WooCommerce Variation Image Gallery plugin CDN filter
Fix: DB cache syntax error in PHP 5.6
Fix: Added missing space to S3 CDN bucket label
Fix: JS error for CloudFront CDN related check on non-W3TC pages
Fix: Page cache unpack warning for empty/malformed files
Enhancement: Image Service pre_get_posts anonymous action now hooked (w3tc_modify_query_obj)
Enhancement: Image Service ajax_query_attachments_args anonymous action now hooked (w3tc_filter_ajax_args)

2.2.4

Fix: Extensions URL in settings
Fix: Redis undefined array key warnings
Fix: Redis connect issue based on phpredis version
Fix: Sanitization of licensing messages
Fix: DB cache error in Ajax
Fix: Call to undefined function in DB cache query class
Fix: PHP 8 compatibility: join
Fix: WooCommerce Variation Image Gallery plugin CDN filter
Enhancement: Add setting for AWS S3 public objects in ACL
Enhancement: Check if post is empty before cache flush
Enhancement: Add max lifetime setting for non-disk page cache
Enhancement: Add notice when selecting CDN using CloudFront
Update: CSS Tidy 1.7.3 => 2.0.1
Update: Add sns-message-validator
Security: Ensure cache writes in cache folders

2.2.3

Fix: Redis Cache: Removed exception on warnings
Fix: Compatibility check for WP_CACHE
Fix: Flush all cache cache except Cloudflare button
Fix: License terms update notice escaping
Fix: Feature Showcase: Image Service activate button
Security: Updated guzzlehttp/guzzle to 6.5.8

2.2.2

Security: PHPCS and WPCS updates
Security: Updated guzzlehttp/guzzle to 6.5.6
Security: Updated guzzlehttp/psr7 to 1.8.5
Fix: Cloudflare flush all cache
Fix: Access log test
Fix: Better handling for PHP 5.6
Fix: Convert Redis warnings to exceptions
Fix: WordPress 5.5 image lazy loading
Fix: Infinite loop when using database cluster configuration
Fix: Database cluster logic
Fix: FTP credentials form
Fix: Preview deploy button
Fix: Image Service links in multisite network admin
Fix: Enable Image Service settings changes in multisite blog/sub sites
Enhancement: Updated Cloudflare settings to allow a global API key or token
Enhancement: Added Cloudflare CDN public objects option to settings
Enhancement: Added timeout settings for Redis
Enhancement: Added TLS/SSL certificate verification option for Redis
Enhancement: Added Image Service visibility option
Enhancement: Updated Image Service limit notification
Enhancement: Better handling of trailing slash URLs
Update: Adjusted lightbox for accessibility
Update: Removed deprecated opcache flush

2.2.1

Fix: Cloudflare: Removed use of the retired ip_lkup V1 endpoint
Fix: Prevent error in some environments using non-direct filesystems
Fix: Added better checking for some filesystem actions
Fix: AWS CloudFront: Reverted async change for cache invalidation to honor promises
Enhancement: Added option to exclude minified JS files from being processed by Rocket Loader
Enhancement: Improved handling of Image Service rate-limiting and error messages

2.2.0

Feature: Image Service extension: WebP conversion options

2.1.9

Fix: Cloudflare Dashboard Widget: Updated to use GraphQL
Fix: Cloudflare Dashboard Widget: Use WordPress timezone
Fix: CDN: Execute purge only if hosting is enabled, to prevent unneeded delays
Fix: Published/modified custom posts not clearing the archive cache(s)
Fix: Native WordPress sitemap caching
Fix: Extra MIME groups other than controlled by settings were added to rules
Fix: Usage Statistics: Not functioning when object cache is set to Redis
Fix: AMP Extension: Prevent popup admin bar for endpoints
Fix: Setup Guide Wizard: CSS for long translations
Fix: Opcache Settings: Validate timestamp indicator checkbox
Update: Remove robots.txt cache toggle setting
Enhancement: Impove 404 detection
Enhancement: Improved compatibility check indicators
Enhancement: AWS CloudFront: Faster cache invalidation using async

2.1.8

Fix: Corrected handling of robots.txt (file and filter)

2.1.7

Fix: Corrected relative paths used in the JS minify YUI Compressor
Fix: Disallow crawling of cache directory
Fix: Responsive display for the dashboard
Enhancement: Added lazy load threshold setting
Enhancement: Added feature policy security headers to settings

2.1.6

Fix: JS minify issue with template literal backticks
Fix: Do not redirect when using WP-CLI
Fix: Missing whitespace in Memcached Nginx configuration
Fix: Setting for CDN over passive FTP
Fix: Updated CDN Minify regex
Fix: Added missing text domains and fixed translations
Enhancement: Allow default AWS credentials provider
Enhancement: Added error logging when minification base URL is not found

2.1.5

Fix: Sanitize extension argument

2.1.4

Fix: Use Memcached server from config for Nginx rules instead of localhost
Fix: Allow more characters in CDN hostname sanitization
Fix: Added missing textdomains for Browser Cache settings
Fix: Avoid a possible PHP warning in LazyLoad mutator
Enhancement: Added a filter w3tc_cdn_cf_flush_all_uris for CloudFront purging

2.1.3

Fix: Authenticated Persistent XSS & XFS in CDN admin page
Update: AWS library version 3.183.0
Update: Minify: Include theme template files using page_* filenames

2.1.2

Fix: Skip removing spaces around “
” tags in HTML Minify
Fix: Updated admin URL logic for multisite installations
Fix: TransparentCDN purge URL validation
Fix: Added an option to use ABSPATH as the document root for Minify
Fix: Database cache debug message
Update: Added regions for AWS S3 (af-south-1, cn-north-1, cn-northwest-1, eu-south-1)
Update: Added MIME types AVIF and AVIFS for Browser Cache rules
Update: Enhanced “get_pagenum_link” filter
Update: Removed “comment” from the non-persistent object cache group

2.1.1

Fix: Move Minify library to a namespace to avoid conflicts with other plugins
Fix: Check for AWS before loading functions
Fix: Update Minify ClosureCompiler base URL; use HTTPS
Fix: Corrected getting the network siteurl
Fix: Prevent PHP warning in CurlFactory
Update: Added information links to general minify options
Update: Added video/ogg support for browser caching

2.1.0

Feature: Added a Feature Showcase to highlight new and existing features
Update: Consolidated cache groups settings pages
Update: Replaced deprecated jQuery method for WordPress 5.6
Fix: PHP warnings for sprintf placeholders in PHP 8
Fix: PHP deprecated warnings in PHP 8
Fix: Browser Cache Quick Reference Chart link
Fix: Bad nonce in help
Fix: Google Drive CDN JavaScript

2.0.1

Fix: Corrected redirection logic for the new Setup Guide
Fix: Fixed JavaScript w3tc_ga error

2.0.0

Feature: Added the Setup Guide wizard for onboarding
Update: Updated jQuery compatibility and methods deprecated in WordPress 5.6
Fix: Browser Cache: Fixed ExpiresByType code; changed from modified time to client access time

0.15.2

Fix: Minify: Do not remove quotes around meta tags
Fix: Minify: Removal of spaces in calc function was breaking CSS
Fix: Browser Cache: Query string was not added to prevent caching after setting changes
Fix: Avoid warning when sending an empty URL for purging
Update: Added a filter for minified JavaScript content
Update: Minify: Added options for minify only got both JS and CSS in auto mode

0.15.1

Fix: Fixed Memcached flush logic
Fix: Remove disk enhanced rewrites when disabling page cache
Fix: Better handle conflicts on activation

0.15.0

Feature: Added TransparentCDN full-site delivery option
Fix: Update settings on activation in a changed environment
Fix: Fixed a compatibility check for Apache when PHP is running as CGI
Fix: Always set HSTS headers in Apache; not only for 2xx HTTP codes
Fix: Implemented anatomic incrementing of key version in Memcache(d)
Update: Allow filtering of w3tc_minify_url_for_files Minify URL for files

0.14.4

Fix: Cleanup widget and postbox display for WordPress 5.5
Fix: Update to PageSpeed API v5, show webvitals metrics
Fix: Console error when adminbar is hidden and PageSpeed module is active
Fix: Stats view JS issue
Fix: Deprecated jQuery warnings
Fix: Require files for request_filesystem_credentials() call
Added option to disable jquery-migrate on the front-end. Fixed #172 master (#240)

0.14.3

Fix: Take “Accepted Query Strings” into account when “Cache query strings” enabled
Fixed typo in variable for lazy loading
Update: Add lazy load Google Maps reference to the general settings page
Update: Support background-image: together with background: for lazy loading

0.14.2

Fixed WP-CLI redirect issue in multisite
Fix: Avoid PREG_JIT_STACKLIMIT_ERROR in minify
Fix: Prevent empty needle PHP warning
Update: Allow to specify URIs with a query string in Additional Pages

0.14.1

Fixed CSS minify URL rewrite logic that affected some lazy loading and CSS URL addresses using protocols

0.14.0

Added lazy loading for Google Maps
Added a filter w3tc_minify_css_content for minified contents
Fixed a minify regex issue in non-Unicode websites
Fixed a PHP notice in WPMU: accessing array offset on null
Fixed a minify issue where embedded CSS URL fragments were converted incorrectly
i18n improvement
Changed default to disabled for wp-admin requests in the object cache

0.13.3

Fixed HTML minification of img elements containing embedded SVG strings
Removed an identifying value for GDPR

0.13.2

Fix: Dont store content of HEAD requests
Updated informational URL on page cache static page comments

0.13.1

Fixed php warnings in PgCache_ContentGrabber.php

0.13.0

Added new Pro feature, Debug – Purge Stack Trace
Added “Feature Policy” security header
Removed deprecated get_magic_quotes_gpc()
Improved AMP Extension by ignoring value of amp querystring marker in request if passed without value in config
Improved lazyload by not processing elements with skip-lazy class or data-skip-lazy attribute
Fixed caching of query-string normalization redirects, no longer cached when cache key is normalized by accept querystring arguments, caused redirect loop

0.12.0

Added querystring based URL structures for AMP pages
Added filter of minify options
Added lazyload picture tag support
Removed footer link “Support Us” option
Improved wp_die handling
Improved lazyload handling of content in script tags
Improved lazyload handling of feeds
Improved printing tags coming from feeds
Improved handling of modified posts before wp_rewrite initialized
Nginx rules changed a lot to avoid “location” block conflicts. That change may cause problems on some systems using non-default WordPress rules – keep a backup of your original rules
Improved handling of .htaccess files in regard to EOF
Fixed Varnish purging
Fixed html minification of data tags equaling 0

0.11.0

Added recommendation for BoldGrid’s Total Upkeep plugin
Added new lazy loading feature
Removed New Relic extension by default for new installations
Updated usage of html minification and quote removal
Improved memcached config and added optional binary protocol setting
Improved process of renewing expired licenses
Improved page cache purging
Improved FAQ link by opening in new window
Improved detection of detect_post_id
Improved REST caching in relation to cache headers like X-WP-*
Improved Vary User-Agent header usage
Improved various features with AMP pages and HTTP2
Improved redis connection string to allow for tls://host:port format
Fixed file headers for CloudFront S3 CDN
Fixed fatal error on with flush / SNS
Fixed comments with URLs within minify debug mode
Fixed ObjectCache statistics within footer
Fixed temporary hotfix with wp_die and regular output
Fixed fragment cache header link
Fixed flushing of /feed and /feed/ cache
Fixed js error in widget
Fixed fatal cache flush error caused by empty $wp_rewrite
Fixed path for file_generic REST caching on non-default port
Fixed test minify button with Closure Compiler engine

0.10.2

Fixed compatibility with wpdb::prepare in WordPress 5.3

0.10.1

Fixed slowdown in memcached engine
Fixed Purge Cache menu links so they flush current blog in WPMU
Fixed error during upgrade, “Call to undefined method W3TC\Util_Content::is_database_error”
Updated Redis cache engine to avoid “Function Redis::delete() is deprecated” warning

0.10.0

Improved Statistics component for pro users
Improved support for CloudFront distributions with multiple origins
Improved redirects by using safter wp_safe redirect
Improved .htaccess usage when pagecache does not require it
Improved protection of unexpected values in global variables
Added more Amazon S3 regions
Added support for memcached binary protocol when available
Added caching for WebP MIME type
Updated S3 bucket creation by settings CORS policy
Updated blogmap to allow urls with custom ports
Fixed usage of base url with minify
Fixed mixing content of sync & async scripts with minify
Fixed S3 + CloudFront urls when CNAMEs not used

0.9.7.5

Updated AWS library
Added support of set_sql_mode by dbcluster
Improved support for webserver running on non-default port with disk-enhanced
Improved menu icons
Fixed php warning when remote service cannot be loaded
Fixed php warnings on support page

0.9.7.4

Fixed PHP warning when Redis integration not configured correctly
Fixed 404 in multisite caused by subdirectory issue
Fixed object cache issue in multisite where object cache was cleared at wrong time
Fixed database cluster in WordPress 5.1
Fixed warning caused by user agent theme change used
Fixed minification in multisite when URLs were set to root-blog based url
Fixed undefined w3tc_ga issue
Improved purging of current page by using post_id instead of URL
Improved cache delivery of /feed URLs
Improved security on calls to opcache flush
Improved minification of files in environments running on non-default ports

0.9.7.3

Fixed caching of redirect responses based on empty response body
Improved compatibility with WordPress 5.1
Improved transports, unix: prefix not required
Improved minify html

0.9.7.2

Fixed fatal error during media file upload with CDN module active
Fixed removal of empty values, JSON encoded string in attribute, trailing quote at end of tag, and the handling of anchors in HTML minify
Fixed undefined index warning
Fixed fatal error when purging CDN using full site delivery

0.9.7.1

Fixed undefined variable notice
Fixed “No such file or directory” warning
Fixed writing to PHP error log rather than WordPress debug log
Fixed default referrer policy should be “no-referrer-when-downgrade”
Fixed php_flag error related to browser cache, using ini_set instead
Fixed Cloudflare IPv6 check undefined offset
Fixed Undefined constant WP_ROOT
Fixed frame-ancestors being overwritten by frame-src
Fixed missing semicolon in nginx configuration
Fixed HTTP/2 URLs handling for browser cache and CDN modules
Fixed display of CDN debug information
Fixed CSS Minification with Google Fonts when included via “Include external files/libraries” and non-latin character-sets are loaded
Fixed media query string not updating when all caches were purged
Fixed double slash with ABSPATH if file exists
Fixed setting max-age and expires header simultaneously
Fixed SASL detection for PECL Memcached
Fixed handling of manually entered objects to be purged on CDN
Fixed query string handling in Nginx
Improved error handling with Cloudfront
Improved page cache logging
Improved multi-tenant support for memory-based caching engines
Improved CSS minification
Improved purge behavior for changed media objects when using CDN
Improved compatibility with sitemap plugins
Added support for Memcached for Nginx
Added support for caching webm files
Added Brotli HTTP compression support
Added StackPath full site delivery support
Added wc_session to the list of ignored query stems for improved WooCommerce compatibility

0.9.7

Fixed minified files not being hosted by CDN when enabled if “host minified files” is disabled
Fixed warning thrown when purge all was selected (via nigrosimone)
Fixed undefined offset error in fragment cache
Fixed MaxCDN test button failure when debug mode is enabled
Fixed purging of feeds when cache feeds option is enabeld
Improved handling of errors when full site delivery isn’t set
Improved nginx.conf to support xml caching
Improved nginx.conf to support HSTS for static files
Improved minify’s handling of query strings
Improved database caching, frequent wp_options no longer flush posts or comments data
Improved Limelight Networks CDN integration
Improved FAQ, they’re now hosted in the GitHub public repository
Improved handling for /<![CDATA[/ in HTML minify engine
Imporved garbage collection for basic disk caching
Improved HSTS support (via Dave Welsh)
Improved reliabilty of CSS embed options
Improved New Relic requirements in compatibility test
Added StackPath CDN integration (including full site delivery)
Added support for page cache priming via WP-CLI via prime function
Added filter support for managing cache groups
Added API for flushing individual cache groups via flush_group function
Added purge support for JSON cache e.g. cached REST API requests
Added filter support for managing database cache settings
Added filter support before (w3tc_process_content) and after (w3tc_processed_content) a cache object is created
Added compatibility for AMPforWP plugin
Added JSON caching support for Pro subscribers
Added additional security headers (via amiga-500)

0.9.6

Fixed anonymous usage tracking, default to disabled
Fixed incorrect minify cache data written if target directory missing
Fixed empty minify cache file written when file locking enabled
Fixed missing commas in CSS (via nigrosimone)
Fixed typo in object cache engine (via Furniel)
Fixed incorrect reuse of redis connections when persistent connections option enabled
Fixed reliability of Google Drive (via jikamens)
Fixed handling of UTF-8 encoded files by writing them in binary (via jikamens)
Improved Full Site Delivery configuration user flow on the General and CDN settings screens
Improved content type matching and cache hits as a result
Improved minify file locking logic
Improved visual langage of the compatibility test (via Furniel)
Improved configuration file management
Improved MaxCDN set up wizard
Improved page cache’s accepted query string handling to handle optional values and add support for disk enhanced mode (via amiga-500, nigrosimone)
Improved handling of timeouts to origin push CDN proviers
Added HTTP/2 push headers for disk enhanced page caching (via nigrosimone)
Added X-Forwarded-Proto header for use cases like HTTPS recognition behind proxies or load balancers
Added multiple CDN support i.e. static file objects and pages, posts, feeds, API responses etc to use different respective CDN providers
Added page caching by cookie name or value (sponsored by SQweb)
Added toggle for CORS header to improve inter-operatbility with various CDN providers
Added support for CDN hosted media to media library (inspired by amiga-500)
Added object caching of AJAX calls (via andyexeter)
Enterprise features are now available to Pro subscribers! Including reading from multiple databases concurrently and purging caches across multiple hosts via a Message Bus

0.9.5.4

Fixed regression with browser caching and query strings

0.9.5.3

Fixed handling of HTTP compressed documents in PHP v5.3 (via amiga-500)
Fixed a bug with accelerated mobile pages (via nigrosimone)
Improved reliability of minify in manual mode
Improved JavaScript interoperability with CDATA use cases
Improved file name generation on Windows for IIS servers
Improved handling of # in URLs
Improved handling of exclusions for e-commerce in Genesis Framework
Improved handling of headers for Microsoft Azure
Improved functionality with existing CloudFront Distributions when configuring Full Site Delivery
Improved minify debug logging
Improved handling of URLs that omit the protocol
Improved handling of custom files with CDN (via amiga-500)
Updated CSSTidy library (via nigrosimone and amiga-500)
Added Swarmify Video Optimization Extension [Hat tip the Swarmify Team]
Added flushing of AMP pages

0.9.5.2

Fixed security issue by protecting configuration data by adding .php to relevant files
Fixed security issue with the creation of dot folders that could be abused
Fixed handling HTTP compression for uncached pages
Fixed handling of .svgz files
Added expiration headers to WebP images
Added support for Microsoft Azure’s latest API
Added ability to cache WP Admin. Recommended setting, is off. (Improved WP Admin performance with object caching enabled)
Added HTTP/2 Push support for minified files
Added option management support for wp-cli
Improved handling of uncompressed minified files
Improved handling of purging of modified pages / posts
Improved compatibility with Rackspace Cloud Files
Improved initial CDN configuration reliability
Improved reliability of object caching
Improved PHP 7.0 compatibility
Improved PHP 4.3 compatibility
Improved HTTP/2 support
Improved CSS embed handling
Improved reliability of object cache, transients now fallback to database
Improved handling of cached http compressed objects

0.9.5.1

Fixed missing namespace, which caused issues with other implementations of Google APIs
Fixed handling Cloudflare zone list being incomplete for users with many zones
Added extension to support Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP)
Added notification for users that are still using PHP 5.2 (end of life in 2011)
Improved default settings
Improved compatibility with Yoast SEO sitemap caching
Improved compatability with Jetpack
Improved directory handling on IIS
Improved backwards compatibility for 3rd party implementations against legacy W3TC functions

0.9.5

Fixed XSS vulnerability
Fixed issues with dismissing overlays
Fixed handling of tilde in URLs
Fixed issue …