Duplicating WordPress Pages: With & Without a Plugin in 2 Minutes

You have built a landing page that works — and now you need a second variant of it for another campaign. Or you want to use a blog post as a template for a series without setting the header image, categories and SEO setup again every time. The standard WordPress back end offers no duplicate button for this. In my training sessions this is one of the three most common points of frustration for beginners. In this article I show you three safe routes — with a plugin, in the block editor and via the database — and tell you honestly which one is right in which situation.

Method 1 (recommended for most): the "Yoast Duplicate Post" plugin

The leanest and safest plugin for this job is now simply called Yoast Duplicate Post (formerly "Duplicate Post" by Enrico Battocchi). It is free, compatible with WooCommerce, Elementor and the block editor, and it leaves no data debris behind. Here is how to proceed:

1. WordPress admin → Plugins → Add New
2. Search for "Yoast Duplicate Post", install, activate
3. Under Settings → Duplicate Post, take a quick look: by default everything is set up usefully. If you like, disable copying of the status (so the copy does not accidentally go live) and change the suffix from " — Draft" to something more meaningful, for example " (copy)".
4. Back in Pages or Posts → hover over the page title → three new options appear: Clone, New Draft, Rewrite & Republish.

What do the three options mean?

• Clone: creates a copy as a draft without taking you into the editor. Handy when you want to duplicate several pages at once.
• New Draft: creates the copy and opens it directly in the editor for editing.
• Rewrite & Republish: like "New Draft", but with a slightly different combination of carry-over options (see settings).

A tip from practice: with pages that use Elementor layouts, always leave the "copy content" option enabled — otherwise the Elementor layout is not carried over, because Elementor stores its data in a separate meta field (_elementor_data). This field has to be explicitly ticked in the settings screen under the post/page elements to copy. If you want to work faster with Elementor, you will find further levers in my article Elementor performance optimisation.

Method 2 (without a plugin): block editor "copy all blocks"

If you want to avoid every additional plugin — a good attitude, the fewer plugins the less maintenance — duplicating also works directly in the Gutenberg block editor. But note: this method copies only the content, not the title, slug, categories, tags, featured image or SEO metadata. So you save clicks on the content and lose them again on everything around it.

Here is how it works:

1. Open the page you want to duplicate in the editor.
2. Click the three-dot menu (⋮) at the top right → Code editor.
3. Select the entire content and copy it (Ctrl+C or Cmd+C).
4. Use the three-dot menu to go back to the visual editor.
5. Create a new page via Pages → Add New, switch to the code editor again and paste the content.

Alternative within the same page: if you only want to copy one area (for example an accordion of FAQs) for a new page, select the blocks, click the three-dot menu in the block toolbar at the top right and choose Copy. Paste it in the new tab — done.

Important for WooCommerce products

Products are not normal posts. If you want to duplicate a product, WooCommerce already offers a Duplicate link in the product overview as standard — you do not need an additional plugin. This also works for variable products with variants and stock levels. Stock is not carried over one to one, though; the copy is created with the status "draft". More on WooCommerce workflows in my article Setting up a WooCommerce shop.

Do you want to learn WordPress properly from the ground up — instead of googling every time? In my online course I show you workflow tricks like this one step by step. Comfortably from home, at your own pace. → To the online course

Method 3 (emergency): directly in the database

I need this method in my training sessions roughly once every three months — and only when the page cannot be duplicated with method 1 because a broken plugin combination is blocking the back end. If you are not comfortable with phpMyAdmin or a MySQL client, skip this section and book 30 minutes of support with me instead.

The basic procedure:

1. Make a backup. Really. Before every direct database intervention.
2. In wp_posts, copy the entry with the ID of the page to be duplicated — new ID, new slug, status "draft".
3. In wp_postmeta, copy all entries with the old post_id and rewrite them to the new post_id.
4. If there is a featured image: also copy the entry in wp_postmeta with meta_key = '_thumbnail_id'.

This is error-prone and really should only ever be plan B.

What to check after duplicating

Whichever method you choose — these four checks belong after every duplication, otherwise it comes back to bite you later:

1. Change the slug — otherwise WordPress has automatically appended "-2" and your URL reads like a temporary file.
2. Rewrite the meta description — otherwise the copy competes with the original in the search results (keyword: content cannibalisation; more on this in my article WordPress SEO fundamentals).
3. Check the canonical tag — if the copy is very similar to the original, point the canonical at the original.
4. Adjust internal links — the copy inherits all the links of the original page; many now lead nowhere or somewhere they should not.

Frequently asked questions

How do I duplicate a page with Elementor content?
With the Yoast Duplicate Post plugin, with the option for custom meta fields enabled. Elementor stores its layout in _elementor_data — if that meta field is not copied along, the copy is empty.

Can I duplicate posts with Yoast Duplicate Post?
Yes. The plugin works for all custom post types, so pages, posts, WooCommerce products, portfolio items and so on.

Is the featured image copied too?
With Yoast Duplicate Post: yes, if enabled. When copying manually via the block editor: no.

Are the SEO plugin settings retained?
With Yoast Duplicate Post: yes, Yoast SEO and Rank Math are copied along. More on the plugin comparison in my article Yoast SEO vs. Rank Math.

What if duplicating crashes the server?
A very rare case — usually the result of a plugin conflict or a far too small PHP memory limit. Solution: raise PHP memory to ≥ 256 MB, briefly deactivate other plugins. A deeper look at such problems in my article Resolving WordPress plugin conflicts.

Conclusion

For 95 % of cases Yoast Duplicate Post is the right choice. Install the plugin, configure it once, then it is two clicks per duplication. For WooCommerce products you need no plugin at all — the duplicate link is built in. You should know the database route, but hopefully never need it.

If you want to master WordPress systematically rather than reactively, my online course is the direct route: I show you exactly the workflows that genuinely save time day to day — from duplicating through to performance optimisation. → To the online course

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Image source, featured & inline: illustrations created specifically in the pletzenauer design (no stock photos).