Concepts
Everything in ConstellaWP belongs to an organization. When you sign up, you get one. Sites, storage destinations, members, and billing all live there.
Organization
Section titled “Organization”An organization is the tenant boundary:
- Members see only that organization’s sites
- Storage credentials are encrypted with a key unique to the organization (not a global app key)
- Billing is attached to the organization, not to an individual user
Owners and admins can rename the organization in Settings → Organization. There is a single owner per organization.
A site is a WordPress installation connected through the ConstellaWP Agent. ConstellaWP stores the public URL, WordPress and PHP versions, detected capabilities, and connection status.
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Active | The agent responded; heartbeats are arriving |
| Offline | ConstellaWP could not reach the agent (timeout, DNS, firewall, or the site is down) |
| Disconnected | The site was connected before, but the token or plugin state no longer matches |
| Revoked | An owner or admin revoked access from site settings |
The agent sends a heartbeat about every 5 minutes (via WP-Cron) with version info, disk space, and pending update counts. A full plugin/theme inventory is included only when it has changed.
A job is an asynchronous task queued by the SaaS and executed by the agent. Nothing blocking happens in the browser: you start a job, then watch status (queued → running → success or failed).
| Type | What it does |
|---|---|
backup |
Archive files + database and upload to your storage |
restore |
Download an archive from your storage and restore the site |
update_core / update_plugins / update_themes |
Update a single category |
update_all |
Combined update (core, selected plugins/themes, translations) |
inventory |
Refresh plugins, themes, and system info |
Failed jobs retry up to 3 times with backoff. Typical timeouts: backup 30 minutes, updates 10 minutes (combined update_all up to 30), inventory 5 minutes.
Owners and admins can cancel a queued/running job and retry a failed one.
Events
Section titled “Events”Events are an append-only audit trail: pairing, backups, updates, inventory, sites going offline, and similar. Filter them by site, date, and type in the Events UI. They are not the same as email notifications.
Examples: site.paired, site.offline, backup.started, backup.completed, backup.failed, plugin.updated, core.updated, inventory.completed, job.queued.
Storage destinations and policies
Section titled “Storage destinations and policies”A destination is a named connection to your bucket (type s3, r2, b2, or spaces). A backup policy attaches a destination, schedule, and retention to a site. See How backups work and Policies.
Hosting connectors (optional)
Section titled “Hosting connectors (optional)”A hosting connector is extra. Every site works through the agent alone. Linking Cloudways, cPanel, or WP Engine unlocks provider-specific actions (list installs, purge cache, server info). See Hosting.