Planned Outage for Block Themes
Simple maintenance mode for block themes. Shows a maintenance template to logged-out visitors.
Solid choice
Planned Outage for Block Themes is a solid plugin choice in 2026, with a few things worth checking first. It runs on 10+ sites, is rated 5/5 and was last updated 3 months ago, and scores 64/100 on our health check.
- Small user base (10+ active installs)
- Very few reviews so far
How does it stack up?
Side-by-side on installs, updates, ratings & support
Daily downloads
Download spikes usually follow a new release — each site that auto-updates counts as a download.
Rankings
Where Planned Outage for Block Th… stands todayWordPress.org search rankings
Live position in the plugin search, top 100| Keyword | Position |
|---|---|
| block-theme | >100 |
| coming soon | >100 |
| maintenance | >100 |
| maintenance mode | >100 |
Version adoption
Share of active sites per release.
Rating breakdown
★★★★★★★★★★ 5 from 2 reviews
About Planned Outage for Block Themes
From the official readme · v1.4.0Description
Planned Outage for Block Themes is a lightweight plugin that enables maintenance mode for WordPress block themes. When enabled, logged-out visitors see your custom maintenance template while logged-in users can browse the site normally.
Features:
- Uses native block theme templates
- Create maintenance pages in the Site Editor or as theme files
- Schedule outage windows with a start and end time — maintenance turns on and off automatically
- Logged-in users bypass maintenance mode
- Configurable expected duration (Retry-After header); during a scheduled window the header reflects the time remaining automatically
- Pre-launch mode for sites that aren’t live yet
- Optional search engine bot access during maintenance
- Bypass link to let non-logged-in users preview the site during maintenance
- Admin bar indicator when maintenance mode is active
- Duration warning after 3 days of maintenance (except in pre-launch mode)
- Returns proper 503 status code for SEO
- Cache plugin detection with admin warning and automatic cache flushing
Requirements:
- WordPress 6.6 or higher
- A block theme (like Twenty Twenty-Five)
Installation
- Upload the plugin folder to your /wp-content/plugins/ folder.
- Go to the Plugins page and activate the plugin.
- Create a maintenance template (see FAQ below).
- Go to Settings > Planned Outage and enable it.
Frequently asked questions
How do I create a maintenance template?
You have two options: Site Editor: Go to Appearance > Editor > Templates, create a new template named “maintenance” Theme file: Add a maintenance.html file to your theme’s /templates/ folder
How does scheduling work?
Set a start and end date/time under Settings > Planned Outage (times are entered in your site’s timezone). Maintenance mode activates automatically when the window begins and deactivates when it ends — no manual toggling and no reliance on WP-Cron: the window is checked on every request, so the switch is exact. The manual toggle still works independently; maintenance is active if either the toggle is on or the current time is inside the window. During a scheduled window the Retry-After header automatically reflects the time remaining.
Does the maintenance template show during WordPress core, plugin, or theme updates?
No, and this is a WordPress limitation rather than a plugin bug. During a real update WordPress creates a .maintenance file and ends the request very early in its boot process — before any plugin code loads — showing its built-in “Briefly unavailable for scheduled maintenance” screen. No plugin can render a block template at that point. These windows are short (WordPress considers maintenance over after 10 minutes) and only occur during actual updates. If you want a custom page for those moments, WordPress supports a hand-made wp-content/maintenance.php drop-in, which is independent of this…
Who can see the site when maintenance mode is enabled?
All logged-in users can browse the site normally. Only logged-out visitors see the maintenance template. You can also enable search engine bots to bypass maintenance mode, or generate a bypass link for non-logged-in users.
What is the Expected Duration setting?
This sets the Retry-After HTTP header, which tells search engines how long to wait before checking your site again. Options range from 30 minutes to 1 day. You can also select “Pre-Launch (indefinite)” for sites that aren’t live yet, which disables duration tracking and admin warnings.
What is the Bypass Link?
When enabled, the plugin generates a secret URL you can share with anyone who needs to view the site during maintenance without logging in. A 12-hour cookie is set on first visit so they can navigate freely. You can regenerate the link at any time to invalidate the previous one.
Should I enable Search Engine Access?
For short maintenance periods (under 2 hours), the default settings are fine. For longer maintenance (over 2 hours), consider enabling search engine access. For maintenance lasting more than a day, always enable it to prevent pages from being removed from search indexes.
What status code is returned?
The plugin returns a 503 (Service Unavailable) status with a Retry-After header, which tells search engines the site is temporarily unavailable.
Will this work with caching plugins?
The plugin detects popular full-page cache plugins (Surge, WP Super Cache, W3 Total Cache, WP Fastest Cache, LiteSpeed Cache, WP Rocket) and displays a warning on the settings page when one is active. Caches are automatically flushed when settings are saved to ensure the maintenance page is served immediately. Server-level caches (Nginx FastCGI cache, Varnish, Cloudflare, etc.) cannot be detected or flushed by the plugin. If maintenance mode is not working and you use server-level caching, flush that cache manually.
How to uninstall the plugin?
Simply deactivate and delete the plugin. The plugin stores options prefixed with pobt_ which are removed when you deactivate the plugin.
Changelog
1.4.0
- Added scheduled outage windows with start and end date/time, entered in the site timezone
- Added automatic activation/deactivation at window boundaries, evaluated on every request (no WP-Cron dependency)
- Added dynamic Retry-After header during scheduled windows, reflecting the time remaining
- Added schedule status to the settings page and admin bar (upcoming, active until, past window)
- Added best-effort cache flushing at scheduled window boundaries via WP-Cron
- Changed plugin structure: split single file into a bootstrap plus includes/ classes
- Changed all admin strings to be translatable
- Fixed readme requirements (WordPress 6.6, PHP 7.3) to match the plugin header
1.3.0
- Added uninstall hook that removes all plugin options when the plugin is deleted
- Changed minimum PHP version from 7.0 to 7.3 and minimum WordPress version from 6.3 to 6.6
- Changed homepage detection to use is_front_page() and is_home() conditionals
- Changed template canvas path to use the WPINC constant
1.2.1
- Fixed maintenance template not rendering when a static front page is set in Settings > Reading
1.2.0
- Added cache plugin detection with admin warning when maintenance mode is active
- Added automatic cache flushing when plugin settings are saved
- Added support for detecting Surge, WP Super Cache, W3 Total Cache, WP Fastest Cache, LiteSpeed Cache, and WP Rocket
- Added fallback cache detection via advanced-cache.php dropin and wp-content/cache/ directory
- Added no-cache headers on all bypass responses to prevent reverse proxy cache poisoning
- Fixed bypass link, logged-in user, and bot responses poisoning server-level caches
1.1.0
- Added bypass link feature for sharing preview access with non-logged-in users
- Added pre-launch mode (indefinite duration) that disables time tracking and admin warnings
- Bypass link sets a 12-hour cookie for seamless navigation
- Regenerate bypass link to invalidate previous links
1.0.0
- Initial release
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FAQ
Planned Outage for Block Themes: quick answers
Straight answers, pulled from live WordPress.org data.
Live data from WordPress.org · checked Sep 28, 2026
Is Planned Outage for Block Themes free?
Yes. Planned Outage for Block Themes is free to download and use from the official WordPress.org plugin directory.
Is Planned Outage for Block Themes safe to use in 2026?
Planned Outage for Block Themes is a solid plugin choice in 2026, with a few things worth checking first. It runs on 10+ sites, is rated 5/5 and was last updated 3 months ago, and scores 64/100 on our health check.
How many websites use Planned Outage for Block Themes?
Planned Outage for Block Themes is active on 10+ WordPress websites and has been downloaded 738 times since it launched in January 2026. It was downloaded 66 times in the last 30 days.
Does Planned Outage for Block Themes work with WordPress 7.1?
Planned Outage for Block Themes is officially tested up to WordPress 7.0.6, while the latest release is 7.1.2. It may still work, but try it on a staging site first.
What PHP version does Planned Outage for Block Themes need?
Planned Outage for Block Themes requires PHP 7.3 or higher. Most hosts run PHP 8.x today, so it works on any modern WordPress hosting.
When was Planned Outage for Block Themes last updated?
The latest version, 1.4.0, was released on July 14, 2026 (3 months ago).
Who makes Planned Outage for Block Themes?
Planned Outage for Block Themes is developed and maintained by Troy Chaplin.
What are the best alternatives to Planned Outage for Block Themes?
The most popular alternatives to Planned Outage for Block Themes are Create Block Theme (20K+ installs), Dynamic Header & Navigation… (200+ installs) and Enable bbPress for Block Th… (100+ installs).
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