How To Upload Files To Your WordPress Site

There comes a time in every WordPress user’s life when they must upload a file to their website. From images, videos, or even PDF documents, there needs to be a way to get them on your server. Thankfully, this is a pretty simple task. WordPress makes uploading files to their site accessible, and we will show you how.

There are two main methods for uploading files onto your WordPress site. The first uses the built-in dashboard to upload files directly to the site.

Login to your website’s administrator backend. Once logged in, use the navigation menu on the left and hover over the menu item labelled “media”. Click on the submenu item labelled “add new”. This will direct you to a page that allows you to upload all your media files.

Click the “Select Files” button in the middle of the “Upload New Media” section to select the files you want to upload to the site from your hard drive. It’s as simple as that. This method is a great way to upload many files to the site simultaneously. By default, WordPress allows you to “bulk upload”, making it easy to upload tons of images and files simultaneously in one action.

One word of caution to note, however. Many web hosts put limits on the size that file uploads can be. This limit applies to mass file uploads and when attempting to upload a single file that is over their allotted amount. If this is the case with your site, simply contacting your web host provider can clarify things. If you’re not using shared hosting and are on a VPS (virtual private server), you can check our previous article on how to increase the maximum upload file size in WordPress to fix this yourself.

The second method we will look at today is how to upload files to your server using FTP. If you’ve never heard of FTP before, don’t worry, it’s pretty simple. FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol. It’s a standard networking protocol for transmitting and transferring files from one computer to another.

Unlike the previous method of using the built-in WordPress dashboard, users must have an FTP client to use FTP. While you can get away with running a website without using  FTP, if you ever plan on doing any severe customizations to your site or writing custom code to enhance its functionality, knowing how to use FTP to upload files will be crucial.

The image above is of a top-rated and open-source FTP client called FileZilla. You can grab a copy of the client by heading over to filezilla-project.org. Using this client, you input your website’s hostname, username, and password into the top section of the client. Don’t know what information to use? Your website’s hostname is the name of your website or its IP address. For the username and password, log in to your cpanel (assuming you’re using a shared host) and find the section labelled FTP to create the necessary login credentials.

After you’re logged in, you can click the button labelled “Quick Connect” at the top. Looking back at our above image, the left side of the program shows your local computer and file system. This is where you select the files you wish to upload to your website. The client’s right side is very similar, with the only difference being that instead of your local computer, it represents your web server or website.

To upload files to your host, select the files on your local computer (you can select multiple by highlighting or holding down ctrl and left-clicking), then right-click and select upload. It’s pretty simple.

So now you have two methods in your arsenal for uploading files to your website. Which method is better than the other? Well, it comes down to personal preference. For uploading images in bulk, I prefer using the built-in WordPress dashboard. If I’m editing code or writing plugins, FTP is the way to go. If you need help uploading files to WordPress, contact the team at Chillybin today.