WordPress Root Directory
The WordPress root directory has 3 subfolders and a few files. You’ll probably be most familiar with the wp-config.php file – the file that you edit to add database information, among other pieces of information.
These files are used to bootstrap wordpress, scaffolding in the code that makes WordPress work.
The 3 sub directories are wp-admin, wp-includes, and wp-contents.
WordPress wp-admin Folder
The wp-admin folder is pretty predictable about what it contains. It contains the files and assets needed for the backend of your website to work. The admin dashboard of a WordPress site is an entire website all on it’s own! There’s a massive amount of files here.
You’ll likely never edit these files, and you shouldn’t. A WordPress update would wipe all of it away.
WordPress wp-includes Folder
The includes folder contains all of the libraries and scripts that make WordPress run internally.
You shouldn’t edit any of these files either.
WordPress wp-content Folder
This is the folder that you’ll likely be in most of the time. The content folder contains your sub directories for uploads, themes, plugins, and more.
Plugins will use the plugins directory to store their code and assets.
Uploads that you upload to the media library will get saved to the uploads folder. Organized by year and month.
That’s it! A quick article. If you’re not familiar with the WordPress directory structure and files, take a moment to give it a look.
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