Connect WordPress
WordPress runs a large share of the websites an MSP looks after. The sites are yours or your clients', they sit on every kind of host, and the questions about them are always the same: what is…
Written By Christopher Scaminaci
Last updated About 2 hours ago
WordPress runs a large share of the websites an MSP looks after. The sites are yours or your clients', they sit on every kind of host, and the questions about them are always the same: what is installed, who has an account, is the site healthy, what was changed, and can you switch something off right now.
Connecting WordPress to StackJack gives your AI assistant a family of wp_ MCP tools. MCP (Model Context Protocol) tools are the standardized commands an AI assistant can call through StackJack. They talk to the site's own built-in REST API, so nothing has to be installed on the site. With them, your AI can:
- Check the site's health - run WordPress's own Site Health tests on demand: whether automatic background updates work, whether the site can reach WordPress.org, whether HTTPS is right, whether the login header is getting through and how large the site is
- See what is installed - every plugin with its status and version, and the installed themes
- Review access - every user with their role, and the application passwords each user has created with when and from which address each was last used, which is the offboarding question
- Read content and its history - posts, pages, media, comments, categories, tags and search, plus the saved revisions of a post or page, which answer who changed what and when
- Moderate and maintain content (on Pro plans) - create, update and delete posts, pages, comments, categories and tags, upload files to the media library and edit images
- Act on the site (on Pro plans) - install a plugin from the WordPress.org directory, activate or deactivate one, delete one, change site settings, create and change users and revoke application passwords
- Work with the site's design - menus and navigation, widgets and sidebars, and on block themes the templates, template parts, global styles, fonts and icons, the reusable blocks and patterns, and an export of the active block theme as a ZIP
- Run what a plugin offers - WordPress's registry of plugin actions (called abilities): list them and run the ones a plugin has made available to the REST API
How StackJack authenticates to WordPress
WordPress uses an application password: a password WordPress generates for one user, used together with that user's WordPress username. There is nothing to register and no developer program to join. It works on WordPress 5.6 and later, on sites served over HTTPS.
An application password has no scopes. It can do exactly what the WordPress user it belongs to can do, nothing more and nothing less. What StackJack can do on a site is therefore decided by that user's role, and the role is the only control WordPress gives you:
- Editor - StackJack can work with posts, pages, media and comments, and cannot touch plugins, users or settings.
- Administrator - StackJack can also see and manage plugins, users, application passwords and settings. On a multisite network, installing plugins and changing users needs a Super Admin.
Create a dedicated WordPress user for StackJack and give it the lowest role that covers what you want. Do not reuse a person's account: WordPress records every action against the user, and a dedicated user keeps the record readable.
Steps
- Decide which role StackJack gets. See above. It is the only way to limit what the connection can do.
- Create a dedicated user. In wp-admin go to Users, then Add New. Create a user just for StackJack, for example
stackjack-mcp, with the role you chose and an email address you control. - Create an application password. Open that user's profile (Users, then Profile, when signed in as them, or Users, then Edit User) and scroll to Application Passwords. Type
StackJackas the name and choose Add New Application Password. The section only appears on a site served over HTTPS, on WordPress 5.6 or later, with application passwords not turned off by a plugin or a setting. - Copy the password immediately. WordPress shows it exactly once, in groups of four characters separated by spaces. Paste it into StackJack just as WordPress shows it: the spaces are harmless. Treat it as a password.
- Enter the details in StackJack. Open Connectors, choose WordPress, paste the address you sign in to wp-admin at (without
/wp-admin), the WordPress username and the application password. If Settings, then Permalinks in wp-admin shows Plain, tick the plain permalinks switch. - Run a Test Connection. A wrong username or password is reported as that. If the password is right and the test still fails, see the troubleshooting section below.
Changing these later
Open Configure on the WordPress connection and change what you need. The username and the plain permalinks switch are shown as they are stored. The application password is asked for again on every save, because WordPress shows it only once and StackJack never shows it back. If you no longer have it, create a new one under the user's profile and save that.
Getting the address right
This is the field worth checking twice, because a wrong address fails in a way that looks exactly like a wrong password.
- Enter the address as the site serves it: the https form, with or without
wwwexactly as your browser ends up after any redirect. StackJack does not follow redirects. - If WordPress lives in a folder, the folder is part of the address and must be entered with it, for example
https://www.example.com/blog. Leave it off and every request misses. - Do not add
/wp-json. StackJack adds whatever it needs. - StackJack reaches the site from the internet, so the address must be public, served over HTTPS with a valid certificate. A staging copy on a private network or VPN, an intranet site or a local install cannot be connected.
One connection is one website
WordPress has no credential that spans several sites: every site has its own users and its own application passwords. An MSP with many client sites holds one named connection per site, named after the site's address, and names the connection it wants on each request. Add each site from the Connectors page with Add connection.
What to know before your AI uses this connector
Publishing is live at once
Creating or updating a post or page with the status publish puts it on the public website immediately. Use draft to stage content. A new template or template part that is given the name of one of your theme's own takes over from it at once, in the same way. StackJack does not treat publishing as a destructive action, because it is what a content management system is for; the tool descriptions say it plainly so your AI does too.
Some deletes can be undone and some cannot
Posts, pages and comments go to the Trash unless the call says to bypass it, and can be restored from there. Categories, tags, menus, users, media, application passwords and most other items have no Trash: deleting one is permanent. Deleting a user also requires naming the user who inherits their content. Each delete tool says which kind it is.
Some writes reach further than they look
Whether your AI application asks you to confirm before running a marked tool depends on that application's own settings; see Destructive tools and confirmation. Review that setting before you grant the Pro tools.
- Installing and activating a plugin runs third-party code on a live website. Deactivating the wrong plugin can take a client's checkout, forms or security offline.
- Changing site settings includes the Site URL and the admin email address. A wrong Site URL breaks the site.
- Creating or changing a user can raise privileges and sets a password. A new user can be given any role, an administrator included, with a password the request chooses. Updating a user can set a new password, email address or role, which can also lock that person out. Both are marked destructive, and each tool says how to undo it where that is possible.
- Revoking an application password stops whatever uses it at once. StackJack refuses to revoke the password it is signing in with and refuses to revoke all passwords of the user it signs in as, because either would cut the connection off in the middle of a session. Retire the connection's own password in wp-admin once you no longer need the connection.
- Deleting the user this connection signs in as ends the connection. The tool exists, it says so, and it needs the user who inherits the content.
WordPress cannot update plugins, themes or itself over this connection
WordPress's REST API can install, activate, deactivate and delete a plugin and report which versions are installed. It cannot upgrade a plugin or a theme to a new version, and it reports no "update available" field. StackJack can tell you what is installed and which versions; it cannot patch the site.
Uploads and the theme export
A file for the media library can be given to the tool as base64 or as a public https address StackJack downloads (up to 25 MB), or you can give the address of an external image and the website itself fetches it. An upload can also set the author, the date, the featured media, the comment settings and any extra fields the site has registered for media, and can switch off the site's automatic image resizing so that the sizes are uploaded one by one, as the block editor does. The site's own upload limit and allowed file types still apply.
The theme export gives your AI a link rather than the file. It works for thirty minutes, so open it or save it inside that window. It only works on a block theme: a classic theme answers with an error. If your StackJack deployment has no file storage configured, the tool fails with a clear message instead of returning a link that would not work.
Lists are paged, and the totals are not in the answer
A list returns at most 100 items. WordPress reports the totals in headers that the tool answer does not carry, so a page with fewer items than were asked for is the last page, and a page number past the end is refused by WordPress with an error.
Abilities depend on the site
Abilities are actions that plugins register with WordPress, and they appear only when the plugin has chosen to expose them to the REST API. Each one declares whether it only reads, changes data or is destructive, and StackJack runs it only through the matching tool: a read-only ability through the free read tool, a destructive one through the marked destructive tool. That declaration is the plugin's own claim about its code, so read an ability's description before running it.
Block themes, menus and widgets are mostly design work
Templates, template parts, global styles and fonts exist only on block themes. Menus, widgets and patterns are site-building surfaces. They are all here so an assistant can answer questions about a site's design and fix small things, but they are the work of a web designer more than an MSP.
What is not included
- WordPress.com's own cloud API and sign-in. This connector reaches a site through that site's own address. WordPress.com sites that offer application passwords work like any other site; the WordPress.com sign-in flow is not offered.
- Creating an application password. The response would carry a plaintext password with every capability of its user, so an assistant cannot mint one. Create them in wp-admin.
- Routes a plugin adds (shop, SEO and page-builder plugins have their own). A plugin that registers abilities for the REST API is reachable through the ability tools.
Plans and limits
Reading is available on every plan. Anything that creates, changes or deletes needs the Pro plan. Business uses the same tools as Pro with a higher monthly call allowance: WordPress has no way to sign in as individual people over its API, so every call is made as the one WordPress user you created.
See the generated WordPress tool reference for the current inventory, plan assignment, input schemas, and destructive-action labels.
StackJack limits itself to 60 requests per minute per connection, because many client sites run on small shared hosting and an assistant paging through a large media library is real load on the site. WordPress itself publishes no limit; your host or a security plugin may have its own.
Troubleshooting
- A wrong username or password is reported as exactly that. Check that the username is the login name (not the display name) and create a fresh application password if in doubt.
- The password is right but the test fails with a not-signed-in answer. Some hosts strip the Authorization header before it reaches WordPress, so a correct password looks wrong. In wp-admin open Tools, then Site Health, or ask StackJack to run the authorization-header Site Health test. The fix is a one-line rule in the host's Apache or Nginx configuration, and your host's support can apply it.
- A block page instead of a WordPress error. Many sites sit behind a host firewall, a CDN such as Cloudflare, or a security plugin. If one of them blocks requests from StackJack or blocks the REST API for signed-in requests, the site answers with a block page. StackJack reports that as a block rather than a wrong password, and does not treat it as a failed credential. Ask your host or the security plugin's support to allow the request; StackJack's addresses are available by support ticket.
- Application passwords are turned off. A plugin or a setting can disable them for the whole site or for one user. Re-enable them, or use a user they are allowed for.
- The site answers "not found". Check the address first: a site in a folder must be entered with the folder. If the site uses plain permalinks, tick the switch on the connection. A plugin that disables the REST API gives the same answer.
- The site redirects. Enter the address exactly as the site finally serves it, including the
wwwform and the https scheme. - An action is refused by WordPress with a message that begins
rest_cannot. The StackJack user's role is too low for that action. Give the user a role that covers it, or leave the tool unused.
WordPress tools
wp_ · 200 tools · Free 119 · Pro 81
Abilities
Fonts
Global styles
Icons
Template parts
Templates
Block patterns
Block types
Directories
Pattern categories
Reusable blocks
Categories
Comments
Content types
Page autosaves
Page revisions
Pages
Post autosaves
Post revisions
Posts
Search
Tags
Taxonomies
Editor tools
Media
Menu items
Menu locations
Menus
Navigation
Plugins
Settings
Site
Site health
Themes
Application passwords
Users
Sidebars
Widget types
Widgets
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