AI Summary
That sinking feeling when you hit Update on a post and immediately realize you broke something. Or worse, you spent an hour reworking a contact form, clicked Save, and now the original layout is gone.
WordPress saves your work in more places than you might think. Between revisions, autosaves, the trash bin, and full-site backups, you’ve got five different ways to recover, depending on how much you lost and when you lost it.
In this article, I’ll walk you through each one so you know exactly which method to reach for, whether the change you regret was 30 seconds or 30 days ago.
How to Undo Changes in WordPress
I’ve broken this into five methods so you can jump to the one that matches your situation. The order roughly tracks recency, the first method handles the change you made 30 seconds ago, the last handles a change from months back.
Method 1: Use the Undo Button or Keyboard Shortcut
Use this when you just made a change in the editor and haven’t refreshed the page yet.
The fastest way to undo a change is the undo button in the top-left corner of the WordPress editor. It’s the backward-pointing arrow next to the redo arrow. You can also press Ctrl+Z on Windows or Command+Z on Mac.
This works for everything you’ve done in your current editing session. Typed a sentence you didn’t mean to keep? Press Ctrl+Z. Deleted a block by accident? Same fix.
Hold the shortcut down to step back through your recent changes one action at a time. The catch is that it only goes back as far as your current session.
Once you refresh the page or close the editor, the undo history resets. For anything older than that, use one of the methods below.
Method 2: Restore from WordPress Revisions
Use this when you need to roll back to a version of your post or page from earlier today, last week, or even months ago.
WordPress creates a revision every time you click Save Draft, Update, or Publish. It also auto-saves drafts in the background, every 10 seconds in the block editor and every 60 seconds in the classic editor.
A single post can collect dozens of saved versions over time, which means you can roll back to almost any point in its editing history.
Revision history is genuinely useful when more than one person edits the same post. An editor can see every change a writer made, and a writer can recover a paragraph an editor cut without asking.
Roll Back in the Block Editor
To restore a previous version, open the post or page in the editor and look at the right-hand sidebar. Click Revisions to access your post’s saved history.
Inside the revisions screen, the current version of your post is selected by default. To see earlier versions, use the horizontal slider at the top of the page.
As you move the slider, you’ll see a before-and-after comparison of each saved revision, the previous version on the left column and the selected version on the right.
You can also compare any two revisions by checking the box next to Compare any two revisions. This adds another slider on the horizontal bar, so you can compare versions from any two different points in your saved history.
When you’ve found the version you want, click Restore This Revision.
Roll Back in the Classic Editor
Still using the classic editor? The revisions interface is a little different, but it works the same way.
In the right-hand sidebar, find the Publish box. You’ll see a Revisions count. Click the Browse link to access your post’s saved history.
The revisions screen itself is identical to the block editor’s. Use the slider at the top to pick the version you want and click Restore This Revision.
Method 3: Restore an Autosave
Use this when WordPress prompts you that an autosave exists, usually after a crash or accidental close.
Autosaves are different from regular revisions. WordPress creates them automatically as you work, separate from the Save Draft flow, and stores them so you can recover unsaved changes if something goes wrong. Browser freeze, computer restart, accidental tab close, the autosave catches it.
If you close the editor without saving and come back later, WordPress detects the unsaved work. You’ll see a notice at the top of the post that says something like, “There is an autosave of this post that is more recent than the version below.”
Click View the autosave to compare it side-by-side with your saved draft. If the autosave is the version you want, click Restore the backup to load it into the editor. Then save the post to keep the recovered version.
The catch is that autosaves are temporary. WordPress overwrites them as you keep working, and clears them once you successfully save the post.
If you don’t see the autosave notice, the autosave is probably already gone. Fall back to Method 2 for anything older.
Method 4: Restore a Trashed Post or Page
Use this when you deleted a post or page and want it back.
Deleting a post in WordPress doesn’t permanently erase it. The post moves to the Trash, where it sits for 30 days before WordPress deletes it for good.
That window gives you a buffer to recover deleted content without touching backups. To recover a trashed post or page:
- In your WordPress dashboard, go to Posts » All Posts (or Pages » All Pages)
- Click the Trash tab at the top of the list
- Hover over the post you want back and click Restore
The post returns to the published list with all its content intact. The same flow works for pages, custom post types, and most plugin-driven content.
After 30 days, the trash empties automatically. At that point, your only option is a backup.
Method 5: Restore from a Site Backup
Use this when revisions, autosaves, and the trash can’t recover what you lost. Usually because the change is too far back, or because you accidentally deleted content that’s already cleared from the trash.
A backup is a full snapshot of your site, files and database, taken at a point in time. If you have one from before the unwanted change, you can restore the whole site (or just the parts you need) to that earlier state.
Most managed WordPress hosts include automated backups. SiteGround, Bluehost, and WP Engine all run daily backups you can roll back from the host dashboard. Check your host’s panel for a Backups or Restore option.
If your host doesn’t include backups, plugins like Duplicator and UpdraftPlus work on any host. Once installed, they create scheduled or on-demand backups you can restore with a few clicks.
The tradeoff is that restoring a full-site backup rolls back everything, not just the post you lost. New comments, new form entries, anything created after the backup, will be overwritten. Use this method when the loss is significant enough to justify the broader rollback.
How to Undo Changes in a WordPress Form
Forms break in non-obvious ways, a deleted required field, a conditional logic rule someone toggled off, a notification email accidentally rewritten.
However, most form plugins don’t save form revisions at all. If you delete a field or wipe a setting by mistake, the change is permanent and your only fix is rebuilding from scratch.
WPForms is one of the few form plugins that handles this differently. It saves a copy of your form every time you click Save in the form builder.
You can get a full revision history for each form, separate from the WordPress post revisions covered above. To access your form revisions, click the small revisions icon at the bottom-left corner of the WPForms form builder.
This opens the Form Revisions panel, which lists every saved version of the form along with the name of the user who saved it and the time and date.
You can preview any revision by clicking on it. The form builder loads that version with the exact fields and settings from when it was saved. Cycle through different versions to find the one you want.
When you’ve found the right version, click Restore this revision in the alert bar at the top of the form.
Now you can keep the restored version as-is, or continue editing it like any other form. Don’t forget to click Save to make the restored version active.
Changed your mind? Click Go back to the current version in the same alert bar to return to your live form without losing anything.
For a deeper walkthrough, see our doc on how WPForms form revisions work. And if you’re new to WPForms, the first-form guide walks you through everything from installation to publishing.
Breaking forms is one of the common WordPress mistakes people run into when they’re editing under deadline. Form revisions take a lot of the stress out of it.
Create Your WordPress Form Now
FAQs on Undoing Changes in WordPress
Recovering a WordPress post, page, or form usually comes down to picking the right method for what you lost. Here are answers to the most common questions readers ask about WordPress revisions, autosaves, and backups.
Can I undo changes after I’ve published a post?
Yes. Revisions persist past publishing. Open the published post in the editor, click Revisions in the sidebar, and roll back to whichever saved version you want. The undo button only works within your current editing session, but revisions stick around for the life of the post.
How many revisions does WordPress save?
WordPress saves an unlimited number of revisions by default. Every time you click Save Draft, Update, or Publish, a new revision is created. To cap how many WordPress keeps, add define('WP_POST_REVISIONS', 10); to your wp-config.php file. WordPress will then store only the most recent 10 revisions per post.
Does WPForms save form revisions automatically?
Yes. WPForms saves a revision every time you click Save in the form builder. You can view and restore any saved version from the revisions icon at the bottom-left corner of the builder.
Can I recover a deleted WordPress page after the trash is emptied?
Only if you have a backup from before the page was permanently deleted. Once the 30-day trash window passes, WordPress removes the post from the database. The only recovery option at that point is restoring from a host-level or plugin-level backup that includes the deleted page.
What’s the difference between an autosave and a revision?
A revision is created when you manually save, update, or publish a post, and WordPress stores it permanently in the database. An autosave is created in the background as you type, and there’s only ever one autosave per post. It gets overwritten as you work and cleared once you save successfully. Use autosaves for crash recovery, and revisions for going back further in time.
Next, Set Up a Backup Strategy for Your WordPress Site
Revisions, autosaves, and the trash cover most day-to-day mistakes. They won’t help if your host has an outage, your site gets compromised, or you delete an entire post type by accident. A real backup strategy is your safety net for the bigger problems.
If your host doesn’t include automatic backups, install a backup plugin and schedule daily or weekly snapshots. Pair that with form revisions and you’ve got recovery covered at every level, from a single deleted field to a full-site rollback.
Ready to build your form? Get started today with the easiest WordPress form builder plugin. WPForms Pro includes lots of free templates and offers a 14-day money-back guarantee.
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