Bypass WP Rocket's caching and optimizations

In this article, you will learn how to bypass WP Rocket's caching and optimizations.

This is needed in the following scenarios:

To check if a display issue is caused by WP Rocket or not.
To speed test the uncached version of your site and compare with the cached version.
To check a change you've made in the code of your site without clearing the cache.

You could deactivate the plugin entirely, but in many cases the following method is faster and more convenient.

Using the query string

Adding the following dedicated query string to the end of a URL will bypass WP Rocket's cache and optimizations:

?nowprocket

When you visit a URL with ?nowprocket, WP Rocket effects will not be applied.

To bypass WP Rocket on your homepage, you should use the following URL:

www.example.com/?nowprocket
To bypass WP Rocket on a specific page, you should use the following URL:

www.example.com/subpage/?nowprocket

When using the ?nowprocket query string, the following optimizations will be bypassed:

Automatic features: Page Cache, Optimize Critical Images, Automatic Lazy Rendering and the others in this list.
All the optimizations in the Cache, Preload, Media, File Optimization and CDN tabs.
Add-ons tab: WebP Compatibility.
Rules applied via the .htaccess file: rewrite rules.

The following optimizations are not bypassed, and you would need to deactivate WP Rocket in order to confirm or discard a problem:

All the rules set in the Advanced Rules tab.
Optimizations not applied to the frontend: all the optimizations in the Database Optimization, Heartbeat and Add-ons tabs (except for WebP Compatibility).
Rules applied via the .htaccess file: GZIP rules, browser caching rules, etc., will still be applied.
Caching from any other source, such as your host, Cloudflare, Sucuri, etc., may or may not be active on the ?nowprocket version depending on how that cache layer has been configured with query strings.