Title: error message / black screen Last modified: October 30, 2021 --- # error message / black screen * Resolved [9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) * (@9minettastreet) * [4 years, 7 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/) * Hello, * Stories look correct in the WordPress CMS preview, but show as either a black screen with arrows (click the circle at the top of each page) or display the following error on the direct link (embedded in the homepage). * “There was an error generating the web story, probably because of a server misconfiguration. Try contacting your hosting provider or open a new support request.” * NOTES: – I’ve contacted the sever, Fatcow, several times and they say there is no issue/errors on their end that would have an impact on the Web Stories plugin and to contact the developer. – I’ve tried deactivating all other plugins and that has not resolved the issue – I’m using the latest version of the Plugin( 1.13.0), the latest version of WordPress (5.8.1) and PHP 7.4. * Thanks! * The page I need help with: _[[log in](https://login.wordpress.org/?redirect_to=https%3A%2F%2Fwordpress.org%2Fsupport%2Ftopic%2Ferror-message-black-screen%2F%3Foutput_format%3Dmd&locale=en_US) to see the link]_ Viewing 10 replies - 1 through 10 (of 10 total) * [Luckyna San](https://wordpress.org/support/users/luckynasan/) * (@luckynasan) * [4 years, 7 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15025460) * [@9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) Hello, thank you for the details. Could you please share a few more details? * 1) Could you provide your [Site Health](https://i.imgur.com/Rtkmsba.png) information? You can share [privately](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSd-AeFLOIJd4NLYz7EDUa9vMfzZIoT5Bn1leV3dL2CM_B1C6Q/viewform) if you prefer. * 2) Does this issue occur if you switch to a default theme (i.e. Twenty Twenty One) temporarily for a few minutes? * Thread Starter [9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) * (@9minettastreet) * [4 years, 7 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15025636) * Hi Luckyna, * Thanks for looking into this. * 1) Yes. I just shared the Site Health privately via the link you provided. * 2) Yes, and I am currently using the default theme (Twenty Twenty-One). * 3) In addition to previous message, the story shows up in the WordPress CMS, but does not generate after clicking “Preview.” Instead I get a white page with the following text: “There was an error generating the web story, probably because of a server misconfiguration. Try contacting your hosting provider or open a new support request.” * Thanks for your help! * [Luckyna San](https://wordpress.org/support/users/luckynasan/) * (@luckynasan) * [4 years, 7 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15025984) * [@9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) Thanks for sending the details. Could you share the following as well: * 1. Can you check if your WordPress site is currently set up to [discourage search engines from indexing](https://jumpshare.com/v/ffBsGM258lPRKBW4RE2U) it? * 2. In the Web Stories Editor Document Panel, what do you have set for Status and Visibility? * 3. Check if this issue occurs in [incognito mode](https://i.imgur.com/ALzgiHp.png) in your browser so all browser extensions are disabled. * 4. check your browser’s developer tools (press F12) if you see any errors. If so, could you provide the XHR response for failed request URL in the Console? * – Go to the XHR tab in the browser Network tab (from your image) – Click on the failed URL in red – Go to the Response tab and provide the contents there * Here’s a video example on where to navigate: [https://recordit.co/90feR8mX5h](https://recordit.co/90feR8mX5h) * Thread Starter [9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) * (@9minettastreet) * [4 years, 7 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15026046) * 1. Yes. That box is NOT checked. * 2. Public. “Visible to everyone.” The circle appears at the top of the webpage, but don’t load the story after it is clicked. * 3. Confirmed that the problem is present in both incognito and regular browsing and on multiple devices and replicated when hosting tech tested the issue. * 4. [https://9minettastreet.com/web-stories/9-minetta-street-townhouse/](https://9minettastreet.com/web-stories/9-minetta-street-townhouse/) “ There was an error generating the web story, probably because of a server misconfiguration. Try contacting your hosting provider or open a new support request.” * Inspect Results (no errors): * JQMIGRATE: Migrate is installed, version 3.3.2 * Network Results: Pressed Command-R and there were no failed urls. * Fetch/XHR: (no errors). Just admin-ajax.php, status 200, time 1.8 seconds * Open Issues: “Audit usage of navigator.userAgent, navigator.appVersion, and navigator. platform” * Thread Starter [9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) * (@9minettastreet) * [4 years, 7 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15026370) * I also ran “Inspect” on the Home Page and the Fetch/XHR showed a second tag: * One or more documents in this page is in Quirks Mode, which will render the affected document(s) with quirks incompatible with the current HTML and CSS specifications. Quirks Mode exists mostly due to historical reasons. If this is not intentional, you can add or modify the DOCTYPE to be `` to render the page in No Quirks Mode. * Document in the DOM tree Mode URL document Quirks Mode [https://9minettastreet.com/web-stories/9-minetta-street-townhouse/#visibilityState=prerender&origin=https%3A%2F%2F9minettastreet.com&showStoryUrlInfo=0&storyPlayer=v0&cap=swipe](https://9minettastreet.com/web-stories/9-minetta-street-townhouse/#visibilityState=prerender&origin=https%3A%2F%2F9minettastreet.com&showStoryUrlInfo=0&storyPlayer=v0&cap=swipe) document Quirks Mode [https://9minettastreet.com/web-stories/9-minetta-street-townhouse/#visibilityState=prerender&origin=https%3A%2F%2F9minettastreet.com&showStoryUrlInfo=0&storyPlayer=v0&cap=swipe](https://9minettastreet.com/web-stories/9-minetta-street-townhouse/#visibilityState=prerender&origin=https%3A%2F%2F9minettastreet.com&showStoryUrlInfo=0&storyPlayer=v0&cap=swipe) * [Luckyna San](https://wordpress.org/support/users/luckynasan/) * (@luckynasan) * [4 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15030129) * [@9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) Thank you for the additional details! * Could you try some things on your end for me? * 1. Could you share what type of content is in [this story](https://9minettastreet.com/web-stories/9-minetta-street-townhouse/)? * 2. Do you perhaps have a different site you can test to see if this issue occurs on? * 3. Does this issue occur if you create a new story? * 4. Do you have access to the PHP error/ [WP DEBUG logs](https://wordpress.org/support/article/debugging-in-wordpress/)? * Temporarily setting define( ‘WP_DEBUG’, true ); and define( ‘WP_DEBUG_DISPLAY’, true ); in your wp-config.php file should show you an additional error message that can help us track down the issue. * Reach out to your hosting provider if you’re unable to edit that file directly. * Thread Starter [9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) * (@9minettastreet) * [4 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15033304) * 1. The content is photos and text, and 4 or 5 links spread throughout. 1a. Everything worked perfectly as recent as October 25th, 2021. 1b. I just updated to version 1.14.0 and the issue has not been fixed. * 2. Yes. I tested it on another site and received the same error after I clicked preview in the CMS. “There was an error generating the web story, probably because of a server misconfiguration. Try contacting your hosting provider or open a new support request.” * 3. Yes. I created a new story that’s just the word “test” and am experiencing the same problem. [https://9minettastreet.com/web-stories/test/](https://9minettastreet.com/web-stories/test/) * 4. No, but I can look into it. * Thread Starter [9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) * (@9minettastreet) * [4 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15033422) * Regarding #4. I contacted hosting support again and we tried rolling back from PHP 7.4 to PHP 7.3 and that has fixed the problem. * Is this plugin not compatible with PHP 7.4? * [Luckyna San](https://wordpress.org/support/users/luckynasan/) * (@luckynasan) * [4 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15033473) * [@9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) Thanks for the follow-up. Web Stories actually requires PHP Version 7.0 or higher, and we do support PHP 7.4. (I’ve confirmed it works with my site on PHP version 7.4.25 as well.) Unfortunately, there is little we can do with this on the plugin side. I suggest checking with your hosting provider that your php file is correctly set up. * [Bethany Chobanian Lang](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mxbclang/) * (@mxbclang) * [4 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15058849) * [@9minettastreet](https://wordpress.org/support/users/9minettastreet/) As we haven’t received a response, I’ll mark this as resolved. Feel free to open a [new support topic](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/web-stories/#new-post) if you continue to encounter issues, or reopen this topic and we’d be happy to assist. Thank you! Viewing 10 replies - 1 through 10 (of 10 total) The topic ‘error message / black screen’ is closed to new replies. * ![](https://ps.w.org/web-stories/assets/icon.svg?rev=2386543) * [Web Stories](https://wordpress.org/plugins/web-stories/) * [Frequently Asked Questions](https://wordpress.org/plugins/web-stories/#faq) * [Support Threads](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/web-stories/) * [Active Topics](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/web-stories/active/) * [Unresolved Topics](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/web-stories/unresolved/) * [Reviews](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/web-stories/reviews/) ## Tags * [black screen](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/black-screen/) * 10 replies * 3 participants * Last reply from: [Bethany Chobanian Lang](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mxbclang/) * Last activity: [4 years, 6 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/error-message-black-screen/#post-15058849) * Status: resolved