Website Maintenance Checklist
Keep your website secure, fast, and up to date with this comprehensive maintenance checklist. Covering daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annual tasks for business websites.
Why website maintenance matters
A website isn't a "set it and forget it" project. Without regular maintenance, your site becomes vulnerable to security threats, slows down over time, and can develop issues that frustrate visitors and cost you business.
Regular maintenance keeps your website secure from hackers, ensures fast loading speeds, maintains search engine rankings, and provides a reliable experience for your visitors. It's an essential part of running a successful online presence.
This checklist covers everything you need to maintain a healthy website, organised by frequency so you can build maintenance into your routine. Whether you manage your own site or work with a professional, these tasks will keep your website in top condition.
Quick daily checks
These tasks take just a few minutes but help you catch problems early.
Check uptime monitoring alerts
Review any uptime alerts from the previous 24 hours and investigate any downtime incidents.
Review security notifications
Check for any security alerts, failed login attempts, or suspicious activity flagged by your security plugin.
Monitor contact form submissions
Ensure contact forms are working and respond to any enquiries promptly.
Essential weekly maintenance
Schedule these tasks for the same time each week to build a consistent routine.
Update WordPress core, plugins, and themes
Apply pending updates to keep your site secure. Always backup before updating.
Run a security scan
Perform a malware scan and review results for any threats or vulnerabilities.
Verify backups completed successfully
Check that automated backups ran without errors and files are accessible.
Test key website functionality
Quickly test forms, checkout processes, login systems, and other critical features.
Review comments and spam
Moderate blog comments and clear out spam from your database.
Monthly performance and content review
Set aside time at the start of each month for these deeper checks.
Run a website speed test
Test page loading speeds using Google PageSpeed Insights or GTmetrix. Address any new issues.
Review Google Analytics
Check traffic trends, popular pages, bounce rates, and conversion goals.
Check Google Search Console
Review indexing status, crawl errors, mobile usability issues, and search performance.
Optimise database
Clean up post revisions, spam comments, and orphaned data to keep your database efficient.
Review and update content
Check key pages for outdated information and update as needed.
Test on multiple devices
View your site on different devices and browsers to catch any display issues.
Quarterly audits and reviews
These comprehensive reviews help identify larger issues and opportunities.
Full content audit
Review all pages and blog posts. Update outdated content, consolidate thin pages, and identify content gaps.
SEO performance review
Analyse keyword rankings, identify declining pages, and optimise underperforming content.
Check and fix broken links
Use a tool like Broken Link Checker to find and fix any broken internal or external links.
Review website security settings
Audit user accounts, update passwords, review firewall rules, and check security configurations.
Test backup restoration
Restore a backup to a staging environment to verify your backups actually work.
Review hosting performance
Check server response times, resource usage, and consider if your hosting plan still meets your needs.
Yearly renewals and strategic review
Critical annual tasks to prevent service interruptions and plan for the future.
Renew domain registration
Ensure your domain name is renewed before expiry. Set up auto-renewal to prevent accidental loss.
Renew hosting plan
Review your hosting needs and renew or upgrade your plan as necessary.
Renew SSL certificate
Ensure your SSL certificate remains valid. Most modern hosting includes free SSL via Let's Encrypt with auto-renewal.
Full website audit
Conduct a comprehensive review of design, functionality, content, SEO, security, and performance.
Review business information
Update all contact details, business hours, team information, pricing, and legal pages.
Assess website against competitors
Compare your site to competitors and industry best practices. Plan improvements for the coming year.
Review third-party integrations
Check all connected services, APIs, and integrations are still necessary and working correctly.
Plan budget for updates
Allocate budget for any design refreshes, new features, or major updates needed in the coming year.
Website maintenance questions
Common questions about maintaining a website.
How often should I perform website maintenance?
Website maintenance should be an ongoing process with different tasks at different frequencies. Daily tasks include checking uptime. Weekly tasks include updating software and running security scans. Monthly tasks include performance checks and analytics review. Quarterly tasks include content audits and SEO reviews. Annual tasks include renewing hosting, domain, and SSL certificates.
What happens if I don't maintain my website?
Neglecting website maintenance can lead to serious problems: security vulnerabilities that hackers can exploit, slow loading speeds that frustrate visitors, outdated content that damages your credibility, broken functionality after software updates, and potential data loss if backups aren't in place. In worst cases, your site could be hacked, blacklisted by Google, or go offline completely.
How much does website maintenance cost?
Website maintenance costs vary depending on the complexity of your site and level of service required. DIY maintenance using free tools costs nothing but your time. Professional maintenance packages typically range from £50-200 per month for small to medium business websites. This usually includes updates, backups, security monitoring, and support hours.
Can I do website maintenance myself?
Yes, many website maintenance tasks can be done yourself if you have basic technical skills. Tasks like checking uptime, reviewing analytics, and updating content are straightforward. However, more technical tasks like security hardening, performance optimisation, and troubleshooting errors often require professional expertise. Many business owners choose to outsource maintenance to focus on running their business.
What are the most important website maintenance tasks?
The most critical maintenance tasks are: 1) Regular backups - so you can recover from any disaster, 2) Security updates - to protect against hackers, 3) Uptime monitoring - to know immediately if your site goes down, 4) Performance checks - to ensure fast loading speeds, and 5) Content updates - to keep information accurate and relevant.
How do I check if my website needs maintenance?
Signs your website needs maintenance include: slow loading speeds, outdated software with pending updates, security warnings from your browser or hosting provider, broken links or images, outdated content or incorrect information, poor mobile responsiveness, declining search rankings, or increased spam or security issues. Regular checks using tools like Google PageSpeed Insights and Search Console can help identify problems early.
What tools do I need for website maintenance?
Essential website maintenance tools include: uptime monitoring (UptimeRobot, Pingdom), backup solutions (UpdraftPlus, your hosting provider's backup service), security scanners (Wordfence, Sucuri), performance testing (Google PageSpeed Insights, GTmetrix), analytics (Google Analytics, Search Console), and a staging environment for testing updates safely.
How long does website maintenance take?
Basic weekly maintenance tasks typically take 30-60 minutes per week if nothing goes wrong. This includes checking for updates, reviewing security scans, and monitoring uptime alerts. Monthly tasks like performance reviews and analytics checks add another 1-2 hours per month. Quarterly content audits and annual reviews may take several hours depending on your site's size.
Let us handle your website maintenance
Don't have time to manage all these tasks yourself? Our professional maintenance packages cover everything on this checklist and more. Keep your site secure, fast, and up to date without lifting a finger.
Packages start from just £50/month
Website maintenance at a glance
A quick reference for your website maintenance schedule.
Daily
Check uptime alerts, security notifications, form submissions
Weekly
Updates, security scans, backup verification, functionality tests
Monthly
Speed tests, analytics review, database optimisation, content updates
Quarterly
Content audit, SEO review, broken links, security audit, backup test
Annual
Renewals (domain, hosting, SSL), full audit, strategic planning
Ready to get started?
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