Hi Stu,
I checked the live form you linked. It is handling a very large amount of media, including videos up to 125MB each, so this points much more to a server/hosting timeout issue than to Mega Forms randomly losing submissions.
The main clue is that the WordPress post is always created. That means the submission is reaching the site and being processed. What is failing is the request finishing cleanly at the end, which is why the front end hangs and the Mega Forms entry is sometimes delayed or missing.
In short, this looks like a site/server-side problem, not bad form data and not a random Mega Forms issue.
Please try these steps:
- Turn off AJAX for that form and test again.
If it starts working reliably, that strongly suggests a timeout during the live request.
- Turn on WordPress debug logging by adding this to your wp-config.php file:
define('WP_DEBUG', true);
define('WP_DEBUG_LOG', true);
define('WP_DEBUG_DISPLAY', false);
- Run one test submission, then check this file: wp-content/debug.log
- If you use Cloudflare, a hosting firewall, or mod_security, ask your host to check for blocked or timed-out requests at the exact time of the failed submission.
If you send us the debug.log output from a failed test, we can narrow it down further, but based on what you’ve described so far, I would be looking at the hosting/server limits first.
Thread Starter
stumur
(@stumur)
Thanks so much Ali.. I’ve actually got very generous server side settings, our server techs tweaked everything to be far more than we need to make sure the issue gets resolved, but still the issue hasn’t changed. So I’m about to try your suggestions.. I’ve looked everywhere in the form backend – I’ve seen AJAX a hundred times before, but now I can’t find it to turn it off! Could you please give me a clue as to where that setting is hiding?
Hi Stu,
The AJAX setting is here:
Mega Forms > Settings > General > Enable AJAX
It’s a global setting, so it won’t be inside the individual form editor.
Also, just to clarify, having very high server limits does not automatically rule out server-side issues. PHP limits are only one part of the picture. Problems like request timeouts, firewall/mod_security rules, proxy/CDN limits, temp upload handling, disk I/O, or other hosting-level interruptions can still cause exactly this kind of behaviour.
At this stage we really need logs from the same failed attempt, otherwise we’ll be just guessing.
Please do this:
- Turn off AJAX and test the form again
- Reproduce the issue and note the exact time it happens
- Send me:
- the relevant entries from Mega Forms > Logs ( also enabled from the general settings under Misc tab )
- the matching lines from your WordPress debug.log
- any related server/firewall/hosting log entries from that same time, if your host can provide them
The timing matters, because without logs tied to an actual failed submission, it’s very hard to tell where the request is breaking.
Thread Starter
stumur
(@stumur)
Thanks Ali!
I turned off Ajax, and suddenly they all deliver within 15 seconds every time, so perhaps that’s the issue solved – can I leave Ajax off or is it important?
Can I ask you though.. in the post that gets auto-created, numbers 2 to 6 “featured images” unreliably get added to the post – sometimes they’re all there – other times, random numbers of images don’t get inserted – the hero main featured image ALWAYS works though. But they are all present in the form backend every time.
Would this be a timing / firing issue where the post gets completed before the form has had time to inject them, so they go missing in the post? Or do you think something totally different?
Thank you, Stu
AJAX is optional, you can keep it disabled, but if you want to know the root cause, you may enable it and try to replicate the issue, then send me the logs here.
I wouldn’t be able to know what’s happening with those images without logs.
Hello, just checking, has this been solved for you?
Thread Starter
stumur
(@stumur)
Not yet mate.. I work all day every day on it as it’s a cornerstone to how my site needs to run. I got rid of a whole lot of questionable php code which got the load times down to about 20 seconds instead of 2 minutes. And I turned off time trap and recaptcha, which both helped delivery too. Now that the submission times are not so bad, I’m moving on to the images that aren’t attaching to the post. I don’t understand how to get the logs out of the plug-in for you, as the ones in mine don’t seem to be clickable. And how do I attach the files here? Sorry mate – I’m not too flash at this!
The logs aren’t exportable from the plugin side. You’d probably need to copy them manually.
You can send me via email.
Thread Starter
stumur
(@stumur)
Thank you, I’ll email them to you. I still don’t know how to get the info from the logs in the MegaForms backend though – is that where you mean? I just get a list of log titles, but nothing seems clickable?
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This reply was modified 1 month, 3 weeks ago by
stumur.
There is a details button on the right side that show you the details from each log item.
Also, debug.log from /wp-content folder might be useful if you’ve already enabled WP_DEBUG and WP_DEBUG_LOG
Hello, any update on this, or should I mark it as resolved?
Thread Starter
stumur
(@stumur)
Oh, sorry mate, yes, I think resolved.
