The “Briefly unavailable for scheduled maintenance. Check back in a minute” message isn’t really an error on your WordPress site.
It typically shows up while you’re updating your site’s plugins or theme. The message usually indicates that there are updates going on in the background to your site’s files or database.
Normally, the message should dissappear and your site should load as expected in a few moments.
Sometimes things don’t go according to plan and the message gets stuck in place. This prevents your visitors and customers from seeing your site and even stops you from logging in as the admin.
Don’t worry. There is a really easy fix to sort this all out.
You’ll need FTP access to your web hosting account and an FTP client. I use FileZilla. You can also log into cPanel on your web hosting account to view your site’s files.
After you have FTP access, navigate to your site’s root directory. The root directory is the main directory where the core WordPress files are stored. Your WordPress files might not look exactly like this but it will be close.
Next, rename or delete the .maintenance file from the directory.
For most situations, this quick fix should take care of the problem!
