A login redirect loop sends you back to the login page immediately after a successful login, over and over, without ever reaching the dashboard — which is almost always a cookie, URL, or SSL configuration problem rather than anything wrong with the password or account itself, since WordPress genuinely did accept the login before the loop began.
Try logging in from a fresh private browsing window
Open an incognito or private window and attempt to log in there. If it works cleanly, the problem is almost certainly stale cookies or cached login data in your regular browser, not a site-side fault at all — this costs nothing and immediately narrows down where to look.
Login redirect loop fix
A successful login that bounces straight back to the login page — usually cookies or a URL mismatch, not your password.
- Full backup taken before we start
- If we can’t fix it, you get your money back
- We never ask for your own password
This or something else?
| Login succeeds but immediately redirects back to the login page, in a loop | This fix covers it |
| Login fails outright with an incorrect password or username error | A different, credential-specific issue, not this fix |
| The loop only happens in one browser, and a private window fixes it | Likely resolved by clearing that browser’s cookies for your site — worth trying before ordering |
| You’re redirected somewhere unexpected after login, not back to the login page itself | A different redirect configuration issue, worth describing specifically |
What you are seeing
- Login accepted but the page redirects straight back to the login form
- The loop repeating indefinitely without ever reaching the dashboard
- The issue possibly affecting only some browsers or devices, not all
- The problem possibly starting after an SSL change, URL change, or plugin update
Common causes
- A mismatch between the site URL configured in WordPress and the URL actually being accessed
- Stale or corrupted authentication cookies from a previous SSL or domain configuration
- A security or caching plugin interfering with the login cookie being set correctly
- An SSL misconfiguration causing part of the site to load over HTTP while login expects HTTPS
- A plugin conflict specifically affecting the login authentication process
What we do
- Confirm the site URL settings match how the site is actually being accessed
- Check for SSL configuration issues affecting cookie behaviour
- Test with plugins temporarily deactivated to isolate a conflict, if URL settings check out
- Clear any server-side caching that might be serving a stale login state
- Verify a clean login completes successfully after each change
- Confirm the fix holds across different browsers and devices
What is included
- The specific cause of the redirect loop identified and corrected
- Verified successful login across browsers and devices
- A check for related URL or SSL misconfiguration
- The pre-fix backup, kept for 30 days
Not included
- Recovering an account where the actual password or username is the problem, not the redirect
- Broader security hardening beyond fixing this specific loop
- SSL certificate installation or renewal, if that’s a separate, underlying need
- Resolving unrelated login issues discovered during testing, quoted separately
Questions about this fix
Why does a private browsing window fix it if the site is actually broken?
A private window skips your browser's existing cookies for the site, which rules out stale cookie data as the specific cause of your session — if it works there, it strongly points at what to fix in your regular browser rather than the site.
Could a plugin I installed recently have caused this?
Yes, a plugin update or a new plugin affecting login behaviour is a common trigger, particularly security or caching plugins that interact directly with how sessions are handled.
Is my account or password actually compromised if this happens?
No — a redirect loop happens after a successful login is accepted, so it's a technical configuration issue rather than anything wrong with your credentials or account security.
Will clearing my own browser cookies fix this permanently?
If the cause is genuinely limited to your browser's stored data, yes — but if the underlying site configuration is the real cause, it will recur for you or affect other users even after clearing cookies.
Could this happen again after a future update?
If the same underlying cause (like a specific plugin's behaviour) recurs, yes — we'll note what caused it this time so it's easier to recognise if it happens again.
Related fixes
If this is the second time this year
A bad update breaking the site is a symptom of updates not being tested first. Care plans run every update on a staging clone before it reaches your live site, which is the actual fix for this happening again.
Your access, your rules
Create a separate admin account for us and delete it when we are done. For anything else, we get in touch and agree a method — never a form field on this site, never by reply to an email.
We back up first, always
Before anything is touched we take a full backup and keep it for 30 days. If a fix goes wrong, we put the site back exactly as it was.
If it is not what you bought
If the problem turns out smaller than what you ordered, we refund the difference. If it is bigger, we stop and send a quote before doing any extra work.
If we cannot fix it
You get back what we received. Diagnosis is on us — you only pay when the problem is actually solved. The payment processor takes its fee before the money reaches us, so we never hold it and it is not ours to return. That is true here as everywhere else.
If it comes back
Reply within seven days of delivery and we put it back on the bench at no cost. The fix is not finished until it holds.
What we are responsible for
If something goes wrong with a fix, our responsibility is limited to what you paid for it. We take a full backup first so mistakes can be undone, and we tell you before doing anything outside what you bought.