How to Setup Local WordPress Site with LocalWP?

Local is the application from Flywheel to install WordPress on your computer. You can use Local on Windows, Mac and Linux to learn and practice WordPress features. The application will automatically install WordPress and start your progress in few minutes. This means you do not need to download and spending time on creating database. You can complete the installation and setup process in few minutes to login to your WordPress admin panel. It is super easy compared to the general local server setup tools like MAMP and WAMP. In this article, we will explain the step-by-step process of how to setup local WordPress with Local by Flywheel.  

Related: How to move live WordPress site local computer using Local By Flywheel?

Step #1 – Download the Installation File

Go to the official Local WP website and click on “Download” button. Local is available for Windows, Mac and Linux platforms. Therefore, select your operating system and fill up the registration details to download the installation package.

The download may take some time as the file size is larger than 400MB for Mac. In this article, we will explain the further installation (step #2) with Mac, the remaining steps are same in Windows, Mac and Linux platforms.

Step #2 – Install Local App

After downloading, double click on the installation file to start the process. On Mac, you have to drag and drop the file into your “Applications” folder.

This will copy the files and create Local app.

You can find the app in your “Applications” folder. Drag and drop the app on your dock to create shortcut for quick access.

Step #3 – Opening Local App

Double click on the app to open. On Mac, you have to confirm opening the app as it was downloaded from third-party website.

Confirm the terms of usage by clicking on “I Agree” button.

On next pop-up, you can turn on error reporting if you want to send errors to Flywheel team. Otherwise, click on “No” button to proceed further.

Before seeing the app, you will see the new features as part of Local Pro.

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Step #4 – Creating Your First Site

Finally, you will see the app for creating your first WordPress site and click on + button on lower left corner or “Create a New Site” button.

Local offers a three step WordPress setup process. As a first step, provide the name for your local site and choose the path where you want to save your site’s content. The blueprint option is useful if you have saved any site as a blueprint so that you can copy everything from that. However, for a first site you will not see any dropdown option. Click on “Continue” button to move on to next step.

As you can see in the above screenshot, Local will use the site URL with .local extension like yourssitename.local. this is different than many other apps that use http://localhost or http://localhost:8888 as the URL.

Step #5 – Setup Environment

On the next step, you can choose the environment for your WordPress setup. Local offers two environmental setup – you can select the preferred option with the pre-selected PHP/SQL/web server.

Alternatively, click on the “Custom” tab and select custom PHP, Web Server and SQL version. This may need the app to download additional files and you will see the size requirement based on your selection.

After choosing the environment setup, click on “Continue” button to proceed further.

Step #6 – Install WordPress

Provide your WordPress administrator username, password and email and click on “Advanced Options” . Here, you can select whether you want to install a multisite or install WordPress on subdirectory/subdomain. After choosing the option, click on “Add Site” button.

You may need to enter your computer’s administrator password to all Local to make the necessary changes.

The app will start downloading the latest WordPress version and install on your computer.

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Step #7 – Check App Settings

After successful installation, you can find the site is added in the app. Click on “Start Site” on the top right corner to launch the server running.

The app is user friendly and you can navigate through the available options to familiarize yourself.

Step #8 – Access Dashboard and Site

You can run or stop the site by clicking on the link on top right corner.

• Admin – click on this to open WordPress admin panel on your default browser.
• View Site – click to view the live site on the browser. Local will use the latest official WordPress theme like twenty-twenty which you can change from your admin panel.
• Go to “Database” tab and click on “Open Adminer”. This will open your database where you can view and manage databases. Local will create database named “local” and using Adminer you can check all table content of the database and play around with running SQL queries. Remember, many hosting companies in real use phpMyAdmin for database management. Adminer has different interface compared to phpMyAdmin. However, this should not be a big problem as running SQL is same on both options.

At any time, you can change the server environment to test the setup and change the site name. Local by default allow the site to run with SSL so that you will not see “Not Secure” warning in Chrome and other browsers.

You can login to admin panel and start playing around by installing plugins and changing theme and modify the settings. You can install multiple WordPress sites and improve your skills quickly. Remember, you can also build a client site and share the local link using “Live Link” feature. This is a wonderful feature to level up your skills from a newbie to showcase sites to clients like a pro. In addition, you can move the local site to Flywheel or WPEngine host by connecting to live server.