Internal server errors (error 500) are often caused by plugin or theme function conflicts, so if you have access to your admin panel, try deactivating all plugins. If you don’t have access to your admin panel, try manually resetting your plugins. If that resolves the issue, reactivate each one individually until you find the cause.
If that does not resolve the issue, try switching to the Default theme (WordPress 1.5 – 2.9.2) or the Twenty Ten theme (WordPress 3.0 and higher) to rule-out a theme-specific issue. If you don’t have access to your admin panel, access your server via FTP or SFTP, navigate to /wp-content/themes/ and rename the directory of your currently active theme. This will force the Default theme (WordPress 1.5 – 2.9.2) or the Twenty Ten theme (WordPress 3.0 and higher) to activate and hopefully rule-out a theme-specific issue.
If that does not resolve the issue, it’s possible that a .htaccess rule could be the source of the problem. To check for this, access your server via FTP or SFTP and rename the .htaccess file. If you can’t find a .htaccess file, make sure that you have set your FTP or SFTP client to view invisible files.
If you weren’t able to resolve the issue by either resetting your plugins and theme or renaming your .htaccess file, we may be able to help, but we’ll need a more detailed error message. Internal server errors are usually described in more detail in the server error log. If you have access to your server error log, generate the error again, note the date and time, then immediately check your server error log for any errors that occurred during that time period. If you don’t have access to your server error log, ask your hosting provider to look for you.
Thanks for the reply, James.
I can rule out my theme because these 500 errors only showed up recently. The only thing that changed before these errors started where some htaccess edits and installing of the shiba gallery plugin. I uninstalled the latter and things seem to be better. I only get the error occasionally now – but it happens to be rather a 503. Doesnt that have to do with server load memory?
Its kinda hard to pinpoint if there could be anything wrong in the htaccess (mine is pretty long) but I reverted back to the one before I made the changes. Do you know if the regular wordpress part –>
# BEGIN WordPress
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]
</IfModule>
# END WordPress
needs to be in specific place in the htaccess, like top, middle or bottom? Before or after regular redirects? Remember I have the W3 cache plugin and it makes all kinds of entries in the htaccess. (Which never was a problem so far)
As for server error logs – where could I access them? I’m on hostgator VPS level 3, with cpanel and WHM. Thanks,
Dennis
I usually put the WP stuff at the bottom. Like this:
1. My special 301s and such
2. Caching software
3. WordPress itself
If there’s special .htaccess for mobile sites, it goes between 2 and 3
