This article lists both the minimum and recommended server setup you need use Smart and have it working at its best.

WordPress Requirements↑ Back to Top

The first thing you need to check is that your web host has the minimum requirements to install WordPress. You can check the full and updated list of WordPress requirements here, but these are the most important ones:

• PHP version 7 or greater. However, any PHP version from 5.3 will work fine. PHP 5.2.4 is the lowest supported version for WordPress, but the 5.2 branch is not longer supported by The PHP Group, and Smart doesn’t support it either. For performance and stability reasons, we recommend at least PHP 5.6 or greater.
• MySQL version 5.6 or greater, or MariaDB 10.0 or greater. WordPress supports MySQL down to 5.0, but MySQL versions prior to 5.6 are no longer supported by their developers.
• HTTPS support.

Smart Recommended Values↑ Back to Top

Smart has some additional recommendations to make sure the theme will work without issues. Most of these items are needed to correctly import contents from our demo sites without server interruptions.

Once you installed Smart, you can check all the current values for these items on the System Status page.

PHP Version↑ Back to Top

Use the higher PHP version available in your web host, or at least PHP 5.3. For performance and stability reasons, we recommend at least PHP 5.6 or greater. See “WordPress Requirements” above for more details.

WordPress Version↑ Back to Top

Use the most recent WordPress version available, or at least version 3.8. You can download the latest WordPress release here. Remember to keep your WordPress version up to date for both performance and security reasons.

PHP Memory Limit↑ Back to Top

This is the maximum amount of memory (RAM) that the site can use for one single page request, and we recommend having at least 256MB. In normal conditions, Smart should do fine with as low as 96MB, but some demo contents (especially those using WooCommerce or Slider Revolution) may need up to 1024MB to be imported correctly, so you should go for the higher amount of memory you can spare.

Keep in mind that your memory limit should not be higher than the total available memory for your server or hosting account, so if you don’t know how much memory you have, we suggest asking your hosting provider about this. If you need to know how to increase your memory limit, you can take a look at this link .

PHP Maximum Upload File Size↑ Back to Top

This is the size of the largest file that can be uploaded to your WordPress installation. We recommend at least 32MB, since some demo contents (especially those using WooCommerce or Slider Revolution) will download a large number of images to your site.

If you need to know how to increase it the maximum upload size, you can take a look a this article . However, keep in mind that this is a server setting that may require restarting your web server (for some Apache and Nginx setups), so in case you cannot do it manually or through a control panel (such as cPanel or Plesk), we suggest to ask your hosting provider for help.

PHP Maximum Input Variables↑ Back to Top

This is the maximum number of variables the server can use for a single PHP function to avoid overloads. We recommend having this value at 3000. Our functions often don’t contain a lot of variables, but we may need to use larger functions while importing contents from demo sites using Slider Revolution.

You can change this value through your php.ini file or through your .htaccess file (only for Apache). However, since some hosting providers often limit the level of customization for their PHP configurations, you may need to ask them for help with this item if the previous methods fail.

PHP POST Maximum Size↑ Back to Top

This is the largest file size that can be contained in one POST request. Our recommended value is 32MB.

You can change this value through your php.ini file or through your .htaccess file (only for Apache). However, since some hosting providers often limit the level of customization for their PHP configurations, you may need to ask them for help with this item if the previous methods fail.

PHP Time Limit↑ Back to Top

This is the amount of time (in seconds) that the site will spend on a single operation before timing out (to avoid server lockups). Our recommended value for this item is 300 seconds (5 minutes), so demo contents can be imported successfully.

You can change this value by using the set_time_limit() function inside your wp-config.php file, editing your .htaccess file, or using the WP Maximum Execution Time Exceeded plugin.

PHP Remote GET and POST methods↑ Back to Top

The POST and GET methods are used to communicate with different external APIs. Demo contents need these methods to be imported successfully.

These features are enabled by default on most web servers, but some plugins (such as Airplane Mode) can disable them. If you see any of these methods as disabled but don’t have any active plugin that can modify their behavior, we suggest asking your hosting provider for help.

Xdebug↑ Back to Top

Though Xdebug is a great debugging and profiling tool for PHP, it may increase the usage of server resources each time a page is loaded or a request is made. If you’re working local, we suggest disabling Xdebug temporarily if you want to import demo contents. Having Xdebug enabled in a live site is not recommended.

mod_security↑ Back to Top

mod_security is an Apache module that helps to protect your website from various attacks. However, some WordPress websites report having issues such as 403 and 404 errors when trying to upload media files and importing contents, so we recommend to disable this module. There are many ways to do this, but some hosting providers force the module to always be active, and you may have to ask yours for help with this setting.

About General PHP Limits↑ Back to Top

Most of the above requirements and recommendations are related to your PHP setup. You can check the most relevant ones in your System Status page, but you can get a lot more information about your setup by installing the WordPress phpinfo() plugin.

As we stated above, you may need to ask your hosting provider for help with some PHP settings, which they should be able to adjust for you. Some providers (especially if you’re on a shared hosting account) prefer to have a very restricted PHP configuration in order to save resources, but more often than not they are willing to perform this kind of modifications to their users’ accounts.