WP-Cron is the single most important part of WordPress. It runs everything from checking for security updates, to cleaning your database of old data, to processing bills. If WP-Cron fails to complete, this plugin will let you know.
The WP-Cron Status Checker plugin lets you know if WP-Cron can’t run and if any jobs fail to complete. It keeps a log of all the WP-Cron runs while also letting you know how long each job took to run and when it ran.
There are two types of errors that this plugin can detect. The first is if WP-Cron cannot run. Sometimes WordPress or your server are not set up properly and some permissions or settings need to be changed. If this is the case you’ll receive an email saying something like “WP-Cron Cannot Run”.
The second type of error is if a plugin, theme or even WordPress core has a programming error. It could be a PHP error, or just something unexpected that causes an error and stops the WP-Cron process. In this case you’ll receive an email saying something like “WP-Cron Failed to Complete”. Below are the different errors you can get and what they mean:
- COMPLETED – The job completed successfully.
- EXITED – This job completed without errors. Most likely this process was designed to exit early and not go through the full WordPress process. No errors were detected so this is considered a success.
- IN PROGRESS – Still currently running.
- FAILED – The job failed to complete. Either an error occurred, or it’s been 5 minutes and the process has still not completed.
- SKIPPED – If a hook is giving you problems and you know about it, you can skip it by hooking into the ‘wcsc_skip_hook’ hook. If you don’t hook into that hook you shouldn’t ever get this result.
This free plugin is available on the WordPress plugin repository:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-cron-status-checker/
PRO VERSION
The free version is limited to logging just 3 WP-Cron runs at a time. The PRO version removes this limitation and lets you keep logs longer and get notified sooner. I will be adding to the PRO version as I have more time and get more requests. So for now you can get locked into a low annual subscription cost (provided you don’t let your subscription expire). I’ll continue to add new features and raise the price as they are added.
WHAT IS TRACKED?
Data is collected for every site (or sub-site in multisite installations) the admin opts in for or that has an active license key. Most data-points are collected on a weekly cycle, and only if there are changes. Some events like license activation/deactivation and plugin activation/uninstall are collected immediately.