Are you stuck with Missing a temporary folder WordPress upload error?

The error is continuously received in WordPress while uploading image, add plugins, update themes or WordPress core.  This is occurs because the temporary folder is missing.

At Bobcares, we often get requests from our customers to fix Missing a temporary folder WordPress upload as part of our Server Management Services.

Today, let’s get into the details on how our Support Engineers fix Missing a temporary folder WordPress upload.

Reason behind Missing a temporary folder WordPress upload

WordPress uses Temporary folder for saving the data temporarily. This folder is very essential in WordPress.

The temporary folder which stores temporary data of apps like WordPress, is identified by specific PHP setting. The data is stored in the temporary folder before being saved to the desired location.

Here, if the PHP configuration of server does not define the location of /tmp folder then WordPress can’t access it. This in turn generates the Missing temporary folder error.

The sample error appear as following.

Let’s see in detail how our Support Engineers fix this error.

How can we fix this error permanently

At Bobcares, where we have more than a decade of expertise in managing servers, we see many customers face error Missing a temporary folder.

Now, let’s see how our Support Engineers fix this error by mounting /tmp folder.

Creating tmp folder

Frequently many customers face the same error while working with the WordPress website. One of the customer approach us, who was having problem while uploading image to the WordPress website. When he uploaded the image the user got stuck with this error. While analyzing we could trace that the absence of /tmp folder created the problem. Thus our Support Engineers create the tmp folder to resolve the error.

1. Initially, we logged in to the cPanel of the customer with the given credentials.

2. After login, we click the file manager option.

3. We then go to the wordpress file location under public_html and trace the configuration file wp-config.php file. We right-clicked the wp-config file and select the Edit option.

4. We edited the file using vim editing tool. In the configuration file, we added the following line above the line which contains That’s all, stop editing! Happy blogging.

define('WP_TEMP_DIR', dirname(__FILE__) . '/wp-content/temp/');

5. After that we saved the file and traced the wp-content folder.

6. In the wp-content folder we created a folder named as  temp.

After all changes made in the files we then again tied to upload the image via WordPress admin area. The image was then successfully uploaded to the wordpress website.

Incorrect Permission

In addition, sometimes even though we completed the steps exactly, we were not able to upload the image successfully. In such situations, the problem happened due to the incorrect permissions for files and folders.

The wp-content folder permission should be made as 755 permissions. If not the error will still persist.

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Conclusion

In short, Missing a temporary folder in WordPress  occur while uploading an image, installing or updating a plugin and so on. This can be rectified by proper mounting of  /tmp folder. Today, we saw how our Support Engineers fixed Missing a temporary folder.