WordPress site all pages go to 404 except home page, even after updating permalinks

Question

A WordPress website I'm working on keeps getting 404 pages to every page except the home page.

I can temporarily solve the issue by going to my Permalink settings and clicking the Save Changes button, however within a day or two it goes back to the 404 thing.

The site is built on a custom theme and there are some outdated plugins that break the site if I update them. Not sure thats the issue though because its been working fine for months without them being updated (I realize this is a security issue).

I've included my .htaccess below because that is was other posts similar talk about but I can't find anything that would cause that issue.

# BEGIN W3TC Browser Cache
<IfModule mod_deflate.c>
        AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/css text/x-component application/x-javascript application/javascript text/javascript text/x-js text/html text/richtext image/svg+xml text/plain text/xsd text/xsl text/xml image/bmp application/java application/msword application/vnd.ms-fontobject application/x-msdownload image/x-icon image/webp application/json application/vnd.ms-access application/vnd.ms-project application/x-font-otf application/vnd.ms-opentype application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.database application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.chart application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.formula application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.graphics application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.presentation application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.spreadsheet application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.text audio/ogg application/pdf application/vnd.ms-powerpoint image/svg+xml application/x-shockwave-flash image/tiff application/x-font-ttf application/vnd.ms-opentype audio/wav application/vnd.ms-write application/font-woff application/font-woff2 application/vnd.ms-excel
    <IfModule mod_mime.c>
        # DEFLATE by extension
        AddOutputFilter DEFLATE js css htm html xml
    </IfModule>
</IfModule>
<FilesMatch "\.(html|htm|rtf|rtx|svg|txt|xsd|xsl|xml|HTML|HTM|RTF|RTX|SVG|TXT|XSD|XSL|XML)$">
    <IfModule mod_headers.c>
        Header append Vary User-Agent env=!dont-vary
    </IfModule>
</FilesMatch>
<FilesMatch "\.(bmp|class|doc|docx|eot|exe|ico|webp|json|mdb|mpp|otf|_otf|odb|odc|odf|odg|odp|ods|odt|ogg|pdf|pot|pps|ppt|pptx|svg|svgz|swf|tif|tiff|ttf|ttc|_ttf|wav|wri|woff|woff2|xla|xls|xlsx|xlt|xlw|BMP|CLASS|DOC|DOCX|EOT|EXE|ICO|WEBP|JSON|MDB|MPP|OTF|_OTF|ODB|ODC|ODF|ODG|ODP|ODS|ODT|OGG|PDF|POT|PPS|PPT|PPTX|SVG|SVGZ|SWF|TIF|TIFF|TTF|TTC|_TTF|WAV|WRI|WOFF|WOFF2|XLA|XLS|XLSX|XLT|XLW)$">
    <IfModule mod_headers.c>
         Header unset Last-Modified
    </IfModule>
</FilesMatch>
# END W3TC Browser Cache
# BEGIN W3TC Page Cache core
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
    RewriteEngine On
    RewriteBase /
    RewriteCond %{HTTP:Accept-Encoding} gzip
    RewriteRule .* - [E=W3TC_ENC:_gzip]
    RewriteCond %{HTTP_COOKIE} w3tc_preview [NC]
    RewriteRule .* - [E=W3TC_PREVIEW:_preview]
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_METHOD} !=POST
    RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} =""
    RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} \/$
    RewriteCond %{HTTP_COOKIE} !(comment_author|wp\-postpass|w3tc_logged_out|wordpress_logged_in|wptouch_switch_toggle) [NC]
    RewriteCond "%{DOCUMENT_ROOT}/wp-content/cache/page_enhanced/%{HTTP_HOST}/%{REQUEST_URI}/_index%{ENV:W3TC_PREVIEW}.html%{ENV:W3TC_ENC}" -f
    RewriteRule .* "/wp-content/cache/page_enhanced/%{HTTP_HOST}/%{REQUEST_URI}/_index%{ENV:W3TC_PREVIEW}.html%{ENV:W3TC_ENC}" [L]
</IfModule>
# END W3TC Page Cache core
# BEGIN WordPress
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]
</IfModule>

# END WordPress


# Wordfence WAF
<Files ".user.ini">
<IfModule mod_authz_core.c>
    Require all denied
</IfModule>
<IfModule !mod_authz_core.c>
    Order deny,allow
    Deny from all
</IfModule>
</Files>

# END Wordfence WAF

Harmonic Harmonic · Accepted Answer · 2018-03-30T17:32:08

The problem is within your w3 total cache plugin settings. It looks like the routing to the cached files breaks, which results in the 404 errors.

To test, temporarily disable w3tc and then see if the problem persists. If it does not, then I would recommend replacing w3tc with wp fastest cache.

WordPress site all pages go to 404 except home page, even after updating permalinks

2 Answers