In the fast-paced world of website optimization, cache plugins stand out as indispensable tools for enhancing performance and turbocharging your WordPress experience. If you've ever wondered about the ins and outs of the BigScoots Cache plugins, you're in the right place.
This comprehensive guide will answer common questions and show you how to make the most out of the BigScoots Cache plugin.
When cache is automatically cleared?
So, for most WordPress Admin activities like publishing new content or updating existing content inside pages, posts, custom post types or moderating, and replying to comments the BigScoots Cache will automatically clear the cache for the required pages. So, you don't have to do anything. You simply add or modify content and BigScoots Cache will take care of the rest. This will work even if you schedule a post to be published on a future date.
When do you need to manually clear the cache?
For situations, like theme settings, plugin settings, modifying theme/plugin code, etc. the plugin cannot identify with 100% certainty that exactly what you did. This is because, with the vast WordPress ecosystem, everyone does things differently. Different themes have different theme settings pages, different plugins have different plugin settings pages.
Due to this, the plugin cannot clear the cache automatically. This is why it is always recommended to use the "Clear Cache for Entire Site" option after you have made such modifications on your website.
You can either clear the cache from the top admin bar:
Or you can choose the Clear Cache option from the BigScoots Cache plugin settings page:
That being said, we highly recommend you read the BigScoots Cache Clearing Options article so that you are fully aware of the different cache-clearing options that the plugin provides. This will help you to choose the right option when you want to manually clear the cache for something specific or for the whole website.
Does updating themes, plugins, and WordPress core clear cache automatically?
Yes, anytime an update operation is performed, be it themes, plugins, or WordPress core, the BigScoots Cache plugin will automatically clear cache for the entire website along with clearing PHP OPcache and Object Cache (if it is being used on your website).
This ensures that al the code changes that has been introduced as part of the update is reflected across the website. You do not need to do anything special. This operation will be taken care of automatically by the BigScoots Cache plugin.
How to check that caching is working properly?
Inside the BigScoots Cache plugin settings page, you will see a button named "Test Cache", clicking on which it will check if the page caching is working properly on your website or not.
Alternatively, you can check the HTTP Response Header to confirm if the page caching is working properly or not.
If you are using BigScoots Cache with your own Cloudflare account then look for the Cf-Cache-Status header. Alternatively, if you are using our WordPress Speed Optimization services or any other service that provides Cloudflare Enterprise integration on your website, then look for the X-Bigscoots-Cache-Status header value to check if your request is being served from CDN cache or not. If you see cache status as "HIT" that would denote that the requested item is being served from CDN cache.
How to check the response headers to ensure the cache is working?
You can check the response header from the network tab of Chrome dev tools. But like most people, if you do not know how to check that, please watch the video below where we have shown you how you can check the cache status from the response header while using chrome Chrome.
Why my cache status is showing as BYPASS?
There could be several reasons that your page is being bypassed from the cache. Let's break down all the possible reasons:
Page is bypassed from cache
BigScoots Cache auto bypasses certain types of pages like cart, checkout pages, etc. as these pages are dynamic in nature and cannot be cached. Alternatively, inside BigScoots Cache, you have the option to bypass any page from the cache, so it is also possible that the page you are viewing is either part of the default bypassed pages or has been forcibly bypassed from the cache.
Logged-in user session
For most websites that allow users to log in to the website after the user log in the page content is dynamically dependent on the logged-in session. Like showing the user's name, cart items, or something similar like that. This is why logged-in sessions are bypassed from the cache. This ensures that logged-in users always see the properly dynamically generated content.
Bypassed Cookies
We also bypass the cache when certain cookies are present in your browser. These include some WordPress session cookies that checks if a users is logged-in, WooCommerce cookies, and similar cookies from other sources that requires the users to see the non-cached version of the webpage when these cookies are present inside the browser.
Cookies added via PHP a.k.a
Set-CookieheaderThis is another common case that we often see when pages are not being served from the cache. Most WordPress plugins are not built with "performance" as a key focus. As a result, we often see that this plugin utilizes code that seriously hampers the cacheability of a page.
For example, a plugin that is setting cookies inside its PHP code will add anset-cookiein the response header to add the cookie to the browser. Some plugin uses PHP Session that in terms adds a cookie via PHP namedPHPSESSID.
As all these cookies are added via PHP (i.e. server-side code), they are added to the browser viaSet-Cookieheader inside the Response Header.
Now, anytime, Cloudflare sees theSet-Cookieinside the Response Header, it thinks that the page content is dynamically dependent on the cookie value and as a result will not cache the page.
So, it is essential to check if your website is using any plugin or custom code that is adding cookies at the PHP level — as it will make your page not cacheable.
You can check the video shared above to see how to check the response header if you don't know how to do it.