Deleting a site from multisite

Hi @mnatseah624, why do you want to delete the site? So I can point you in the right direction.

You have several options:

* Deactivate the site: it doesn’t permanently delete the site which can be reactivated at any time. Neither the front end nor the site admin screens are accessible but can be accesed as Superadmin.
* Archive marks a site as being archived so it’s not accessible by users. The admin screens can be accessed but not the front end.
* Delete deletes the site forever. Use this option with caution since it is not recoverable unless you have a backup.

By all means, do not delete it using MySQL Databases > Delete.

Hope that helped!

I usually don’t delete them but just quit using that one site I no longer want.

If you need or really want to delete a subsite then delete from the network admin dashboard. Never do that from the database itself.

Thanks @jnashhawkins and @developress
It took me a while to get my multisite working. The fall-out was three databases/sites that are completely non-functional (one from my old single site and two first-attempt multisites). I have now renamed them (in MySQL Databases) and their absence doesn’t make any difference to my functioning site. They are also taking up 20 MB of space so I think it would be best to get rid of them. I actually can’t delete these through Network Admin, because they don’t appear there. The only possible way I can see to delete them is thru MySQL Databases.
(Btw I have other issues with my functioning sites, but I’m tackling things slowly, one issue at a time.)
But why do you both caution so strongly about deleting thru MySQL Databases when I can’t access the redundant sites thru Network Admin?
Thanks

You were asking as if you were going to delete one single site of a multisite via phpMyAdmin. Deleting a site via the database of the working multisite is not a good idea.

Deleting the non-working database of a non-working website is not the same concept. Do be careful but if the site doesn’t work at all then that’s the only choice you have.

Thanks @jnashhawkins I will certainly be very careful. Just establishing the procedure at this stage. Apart from that…
I have three sites that are still visible/working: (1) brightmorningstar.org (main site) (2) christmascantata.brightmorningstar.org; (3) shop.brightmorningstar.org.
BUT…

(1) The main site (brightmorningstar.org) is on one database. But in PHPMyAdmin it has three options files, one for each site. But 2_options (shop) and 3_options (christmascantata) have no content. Instead, the content of the two subdomains is in two other databases, as follows:
(2) christmascantata has its own separate database with only one options file.
(3) shop has two options files (shop and shop/staging).

Is this normal? Or should all three sites really be inside the main brightmorningstar database?
Also, how can I set up my staging site so it backs up the entire multisite and not just one subdomain (shop)?

• This reply was modified 4 years, 11 months ago by mnatseah624.

Sounds like those other two sites are not in your multisite but are in subsites within your host.

If they were actually in your multisite then their data would be in the multisite’s database.

There’s documentation about migrating sites into a multisite… just take your time.