When you open a new WordPress installation, the homepage shows a list of your latest posts. That has been the WordPress default since 2003 — after all, WordPress was pure blogging software back then. Today, though, most websites need a proper landing page as their homepage, with a headline, benefits, a call to action and evidence. In this article I show you in five clicks how to switch the homepage — and which SEO trap is often overlooked in the process.
Where is the homepage set?
The setting hides in a place nobody looks for it: under Settings → Reading. Not under "Pages", not under "Customizer", not under "Appearance". In the admin sidebar:
- Settings → Reading
- Under "Your homepage displays" you have two options:
– Your latest posts (default)
– A static page (select below)
- If you choose "A static page", two dropdowns appear: Homepage and Posts page.
- For Homepage, select the page that is to serve as your start page (created beforehand under Pages → Add New, for example "Home" or "Start").
- For Posts page, optionally select a page on which the blog overview should appear (for example an empty page called "Blog" or "News").
- Save changes.
That is it. The next time your domain is called up, visitors see the static page.
What exactly does "posts page" mean?
This is where the concept often tips over. The "posts page" is not the page on which individual blog posts appear — those are still rendered at their own URL. The "posts page" is the overview page of your blog list. In the back end it is a completely ordinary page (often with the slug /blog/) which you can even leave empty. WordPress automatically replaces the actual content of this page with the list of latest posts.
That has two consequences:
- Whatever you write into the content area of the "posts page" in the editor is not displayed. Only the title and the SEO fields are used.
- If you want to build a page builder layout (Elementor, Divi and so on) on the "posts page", you have to use a different page and let the page builder render the blog archive itself — or use a custom template file in the theme.
Which variant is right for you?
In my training sessions I recommend the static homepage in 99 % of cases for every website that is more than a classic blog. Specifically:
- Static homepage → for service providers, coaches, local businesses, shops, B2B sites, association websites.
- Post list as homepage → only for pure magazines, journalistic blogs, personal diaries.
Even classic blogs often benefit from a static homepage with featured posts, a newsletter sign-up and topic clusters, because that markedly improves newsletter conversion and time on site.
Common traps and how to solve them
Trap 1: duplicate blog overview (content duplication)
If you use a page called "Blog" for the blog overview while a theme-standard archive also runs at /category/ or /blog/, you have two URLs with the same function → duplicate content. Google indexes one of them and ignores the other; in the worst case the wrong one.
Solution: set one of the two routes to "noindex" via canonical or through the SEO plugin (Yoast / Rank Math). More on cannibalisation in my article WordPress SEO fundamentals.
Trap 2: permalinks break
Sometimes the permalink structure gets stuck after the switch. The classic symptom: every blog post shows "page not found". Solution: Settings → Permalinks → Save changes (even if you change nothing — the save button regenerates the .htaccess rules). Works in 90 % of cases.
Trap 3: the page builder does not render the new homepage correctly
With Elementor, Divi or Beaver Builder, the homepage must have been edited with that particular page builder — otherwise the default theme layout takes precedence. When in doubt: open the page, create the page builder layout again, save.
Trap 4: the customizer says "static page", but the list appears anyway
Caching. Clear the caching plugin, clear the CDN, clear your own browser cache (Cmd+Shift+R / Ctrl+F5). If that does not help: load it once in incognito mode, then you know whether the problem sits on the server or in the browser.
Trap 5: SEO title and meta description still say "example domain"
Yoast SEO and Rank Math do not automatically adopt the SEO values of the linked page for the homepage. You have to set the SEO title and meta description separately under Yoast → General → Search Appearance → Homepage (or Rank Math → Titles & Meta → Homepage). Anyone who forgets this has their homepage in the Google results with the worst possible snippet. More in the existing article Yoast SEO vs. Rank Math.
Do you want to set up WordPress cleanly from the start — without these standard traps? In my online course I show you exactly the order in which I set up a new WordPress installation: homepage, permalinks, SEO, security, performance. → To the online course
Special case: multilingual homepages
If you work with WPML, Polylang or TranslatePress, each language gets its own homepage. The "static page" setting applies per language. That means: create a separate homepage page for each language and link them in the plugin. A detailed comparison of the three plugins in my article Multilingual WordPress.
Special case: custom post types as the homepage
Do you want the homepage to be a single entry of a custom post type (a WooCommerce product or a custom event, for example)? That is not possible via the standard setting. The solution is to set a template_redirect function via the theme or a code snippet that renders the desired content for the root URL. For non-developers this is rarely the right route — usually there is a better solution using a normal page with embedded content.
Frequently asked questions
Where do I find the "set homepage" option in the new site editor (FSE)?
With block themes this also goes through Settings → Reading — the path does not change. What changes is editing the page itself (in the site editor instead of the classic editor).
What happens to the previous blog overview when I switch to static?
It disappears from the root URL but remains reachable — either via the page you selected as the "posts page", or via category archives (/category/…) and tag archives. You should therefore add a link to the new "Blog" page in your menu.
Can I set the homepage for a single language differently from the main language?
With WPML, Polylang and TranslatePress: yes, separately per language. With WordPress standard and no multilingual plugin: no.
How does the switch affect SEO?
The domain root URL now points to new content. Google has to reindex — that takes a few days to weeks. Important: check old internal links to the previous homepage (for example "/?page_id=2") and redirect them to the new page if necessary.
Do I have to save the permalinks again after switching?
Recommended, yes. It avoids 404 errors.
Conclusion
A static homepage is the right choice for almost every WordPress site. The switch takes less than two minutes — the real work lies in designing the new page itself and in the SEO fine-tuning around it.
If you want to set up the first 30 days of a WordPress site systematically, without wading through contradictory tutorials, my online course gets you there: step by step from installation to going live. → To the online course
Image source, featured & inline: illustrations created specifically in the pletzenauer design (no stock photos).
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