What is the WordPress Settings Menu?
The WordPress Settings menu is the section of the WordPress admin sidebar where you configure sitewide options. Its 7 core screens are General, Writing, Reading, Discussion, Media, Permalinks, and Privacy, covering your site title, time zone, homepage display, comment rules, image sizes, URL structure, and privacy policy page. Plugins you install can add screens of their own.
More About the WordPress Settings Menu
You’ll find the Settings menu near the bottom of the left sidebar in the Dashboard, the admin area of every WordPress site. It holds the options that apply to the whole site rather than to a single post or page, and a default install gives it 7 core screens.
The 7 core Settings screens
Each screen controls one slice of sitewide behavior:
- General: site title, tagline, time zone, the administration email address, whether anyone can register an account, and the WordPress Address (URL) and Site Address (URL) fields that tell WordPress where the site lives.
- Writing: the default post category and, if your active theme supports post formats, the default post format. Posting by email is set up here too.
- Reading: whether your homepage shows your latest posts (right for a blog) or a static page (right for a business site), how many posts pages and feeds show, and the Search Engine Visibility checkbox.
- Discussion: comment rules, including whether visitors can comment on new posts, which comments wait for moderation, and whether pingbacks and trackbacks from other sites are accepted.
- Media: the image sizes WordPress generates when you upload a picture, covered in detail in the Media settings entry.
- Permalinks: the structure of your site’s URLs. Changing it on an established site changes every public URL, so inbound links can break unless redirects are in place. The permalink entry explains the structures.
- Privacy: where you create or designate the site’s privacy policy page, which WordPress shows on your login and registration pages. This screen was added in WordPress 4.9.6 (May 2018).
Two settings that can take your site offline or out of search
The URL fields on the General screen deserve the most care. WordPress Address (URL) and Site Address (URL) tell WordPress where it’s installed and where visitors reach it. Change them only when you’re genuinely moving the site: a typo can make both the site and the login page unreachable. If that happens, the WP_HOME and WP_SITEURL constants in wp-config.php override the saved values and get you back in.
The Reading screen’s Search Engine Visibility box is the other trap. Checking “Discourage search engines from indexing this site” adds a noindex,nofollow robots tag to every page (WordPress 5.3 and later), which is useful while you build a site and the classic reason a finished one never appears in Google. It’s only a request, so search engines can ignore it, and it doesn’t block visitors. Uncheck it before launch.
Settings vs. the menus visitors see
The Settings menu doesn’t manage your site’s navigation. The menu visitors use to move around your site is edited under Appearance → Menus on classic themes, or with the Navigation block in the Site Editor on block themes (WordPress 5.9 and later). The Screen Options tab at the top of each admin screen isn’t part of Settings either: it only changes which panels that particular screen displays.
If you’re setting up a new site, start with General and Reading, then work through the rest. Our screen-by-screen guide to WordPress settings covers what to choose on each screen.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why can't I see the Settings menu in my WordPress dashboard?
Your user role lacks the manage_options capability, which WordPress checks before showing the Settings menu. By default only Administrators have it. Ask an Administrator to change the setting for you; if you need ongoing access, a custom role that grants just manage_options is safer than full Administrator access.
What happens if I change the WordPress Address (URL) and my site breaks?
You can fix it without the dashboard. Connect over SFTP or your host's file manager, open wp-config.php, and define the WP_HOME and WP_SITEURL constants with the correct addresses. Those constants override whatever the General screen saved, and the fields stay locked until you remove them.
Where do plugin settings appear in WordPress?
It varies by plugin. Many add a submenu under Settings, others add their own top-level menu in the sidebar, and some do both. If you can't find a plugin's options, check the sidebar first, then look for a Settings link on the plugin's row on the Plugins screen.
