The WordPress “no-update required” loop

WP-No-Update-Required-Loop

The Problem

You try to login to your WordPress site at www.mysite.com/wp-admin and get redirected to  www.mysite.com/wp-admin/upgrade.php?_wp_http_referer=%2Fwp-admin%2F

You see the message “No Update Required. Your WordPress database is already up-to-date”  You press “Continue” but instead of going to the login screen you find yourself on the home page. It’s a loop.

The Solution

Memcache on your server is likely the cause and needs flushing.   Memcache speeds up database calls by storing data in the server’s RAM to reduce the number of times a database is queried.

If your host is SiteGround (the Grow Big or Go Geek plans) you can login to your cPanel go to SuperCacher and “flush” your Memcache there.  Memcache is generally not available on shared hosting,  but it is with SiteGround.

If you don’t have Memcache try disabling any caching programs you have via an ftp program (like FileZilla) by going to /public_html/wp-content/plugins/your cache program and rename the folder. You do this by right clicking on the folder (as below) and add a digit to the end of the folder name. My caching program here is WP Rocket, but you may have something like the popular WP Cache or W3 Total Cache plugins.

You could also rename the entire plugins folder if you think other plugins could also be caching.

FileZilla-wordpress-no-update

Finally you could try manually uploading a fresh install of WordPress via ftp. You only need to drag the unzipped WordPress folder to the root of your site and allow all overwriting when prompted. Failing this it could be time to call your hosting company.

Posted in
DWcircle

I build websites at WP Corner Shop and travel. I also co-host a weekly WordPress podcast called WP Builds and make YouTube videos.

17 Comments

  1. Jon Symons Jon Symons on 8th December 2016 at 5:04 pm

    Thanks a lot. Flushing the cache on SiteGround did the trick!

    • David Waumsley David Waumsley on 8th December 2016 at 5:24 pm

      Hey thanks Jon. I really appreciate your comment to let me know :-)

  2. Carolyn Carolyn on 14th December 2016 at 6:58 pm

    Same here. It worked on my blog. Thanks.

    • David Waumsley David Waumsley on 24th December 2016 at 9:29 pm

      Whoops – sorry Carolyn. I missed this. Thanks for letting me know.

  3. Michael Curry Michael Curry on 13th January 2017 at 12:59 am

    Hi David, the Siteground flush did the job – thanks for your help.

  4. Jamie Foster Jamie Foster on 15th February 2017 at 5:06 pm

    The struggle is real!
    Thanks so much for your help.

  5. Brett Brett on 3rd May 2017 at 8:15 pm

    THANK YOU. gosh darn it. Thank you. I forgot that we had MAX CDN enabled – i had to go into my settings and purge cache

  6. Simon Jordan Simon Jordan on 6th December 2018 at 8:28 pm

    Superb. Siteground user – solved the problem in 20 seconds thanks to your post.
    Thanks so much.

  7. Marc Marc on 30th December 2018 at 5:08 pm

    Thanks, this was a great help. I upgraded to WordPress 5 the other day, and the first thing I saw was the seemingly infinite loop telling me my WordPress was already up-to-date. I’m not a WordPress expert, so this was extremely worrisome.

    I found your post, and since I’m a Siteground user, I flushed the three levels of cache in the “Supercacher”, and then my site was back to normal.

  8. Alexandr Anaya Alexandr Anaya on 3rd February 2019 at 5:47 pm

    Thank you David, you saved me a lot of troubleshooting time! Cheers!

    • David Waumsley David Waumsley on 5th February 2019 at 4:35 am

      And thank you too for taking the time to comment. Appreciated :-)

  9. William William on 22nd February 2019 at 5:50 pm

    Thanks, it was really that easy – and NOTHING is ever that easy!

  10. Andrea Andrea on 22nd February 2019 at 6:03 pm

    Thank you! So easy and it’s fixed now.

  11. Christoph Christoph on 5th March 2019 at 8:55 am

    Thank you!

    I had the same issue but not related to Memcache. The cause turned out to be the W3 Total Cache plugin. I deleted the files inside the wp-content/cache folder, that solved the problem. No deactivation of plugins was necessary.

    • David Waumsley David Waumsley on 9th March 2019 at 7:52 am

      Thanks, Christoph. Good problem-solving. W3 Total Cache was always too much for me.

  12. WordPress Development WordPress Development on 6th May 2019 at 7:31 am

    Thanks for sharing this.

  13. Join Join on 3rd April 2024 at 4:20 pm

    Ran into this loop nightmare after a recent update and was scratching my head for hours. Your post was a lifesaver, David! Flushing the cache was the golden ticket. For anyone else struggling with site issues, checking out this comprehensive study on the on-demand app industry might give you some insights into optimizing your WordPress site for better performance: https://attractgroup.com/blog/the-on-demand-app-industry-a-comprehensive-study/. Cheers for the help!

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