The File Manager in your Managed WordPress dashboard lets you browse, edit, upload, download, and organize your site’s files right in your browser, with no File Transfer Protocol (FTP) client needed. It lives in the Management tab and works on your site’s main WordPress folder. Use it for quick edits to text and code files up to 2 MB, then switch to Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP) for images, archives, and larger files.
This Knowledge Base article explains how to use the File Manager for a website created with your Managed WordPress service.
The File Manager tool can be found in the Management tab:
- Click a folder to open it, then use the breadcrumb or the back arrow to move back up.
- Each file and folder shows its size and when it was modified, with the actions on the right: view, download, edit, move, and delete.
- The toolbar holds the New Folder and New File buttons, plus a refresh button.
Common Tasks
- Edit a file: Click the file, or its edit action, to open the built-in text editor, make your change, and save.
- Create a file or folder: Click New File or New Folder, give it a name, and save.
- Upload or download: Upload files into the folder you have open, or download any file to your computer.
- Rename or move: Use the move or rename action and pick a destination. You can select several items and move or delete them together.
- Delete: This removes a file. If a folder isn’t empty, we’ll ask you to confirm that you want to delete its contents too.
What You Can & Can’t Do
The File Manager is for quick edits to your site’s text and code files. A few limits keep it safe and fast:
- Text files only in the editor. You can open and edit recognized text and code files, such as PHP, HTML, CSS, JS, JSON, .txt, and .md. Images, PDFs, ZIPs, and other binary or executable files can’t be opened or edited here, so you’ll see a “binary file” or “unsupported type” message. Transfer those over FTP (SFTP) access instead. You can still delete any file you can see, whatever its type.
- Files must be plain UTF-8 text. We refuse to open a file saved in an older encoding, for example Latin-1, so it doesn’t get corrupted. Convert it over SFTP or Secure Shell (SSH) first.
- 2 MB edit limit. You can’t edit files larger than 2 MB in the browser, so use SFTP for the big ones.
- Filename rules. New names have to start with a letter or number and can use only letters, numbers, dots, underscores, and hyphens, up to 255 characters. You can’t create hidden “dot” files (like .htaccess) here, so create those over SFTP or SSH. Existing ones still show up in the list.
- Big folders are capped at 200 items. A folder listing shows up to 200 entries and then marks itself as truncated, so open the subfolders to see the rest. There’s no “next page”. Deleting a folder tree has the same 200-item limit, so split large deletions or use SSH.
- Deleting a folder that isn’t empty removes everything inside it, and we’ll ask you to confirm that first.
- We catch editing conflicts. If a file changed since you opened it, we’ll reject your save to protect the newer version. Re-open the file, re-apply your change, and save again.
- Same files everywhere. The File Manager, FTP, and SSH all work on the same folder, your site’s webroot, and your changes take effect on your live site immediately. There’s no protection on sensitive files like wp-config.php, so take care when you edit core or configuration files.
If you need help with your HostPapa account, please open a support ticket from your dashboard.
