The WordPress customizer is a core function built-into WordPress so as long as your server supports WordPress then the Customizer should work 100%. That said, there are some known plugins that could break things as well as specific server settings that could cause issues. Below is a list of the troubleshooting steps to go through to figure out why your Customizer isn’t working correctly.
Step 1: Test another browser and/or close tabs
We’ve noticed the WordPress Customizer can get a bit buggy in the Chrome browser (especially when you have multiple tabs open). From our test we found that the Customizer performs much better in the latest version of Firefox. Results may very depending on your computer, but it’s worth testing out if you haven’t tried in this browser. Also if you have multiple tabs open in your browser (especially if you are watching some sort of video such as Youtube or Netflix) it can slow things down when opening and closing tabs/panels.
Step 2: Clear your Cache
A lot of times people have problems with WordPress because they recently updated a plugin, theme or WordPress itself and didn’t clear their cache. So please make sure to clear it just to be certain that isn’t the problem.
Clear Your Cache Clear Browser Cache
Step 3: Make Sure Your Host Supports WordPress (check that your PHP version is up to date)
If a core function isn’t working it’s possible your webhost doesn’t fully support WordPress, please make sure it does. Specifically the theme uses anonymous functions that were introduced in PHP 5.3 and if your server has an outdated version of PHP that doesn’t support these functions then the Customizer may not load or will display an error like this “Parse error: syntax error, unexpected T_FUNCTION in…”.
Step 4: Increase Server Memory Limit To PHP
Oftentimes the customizer doesn’t save because your memory limit is set too low on your server. This is common on shared hosting plans or other affordable hosting plans.
Step 5: Make sure there aren’t any Debug Errors
Total has been coded with WP_Debug enabled to make sure there aren’t any single PHP errors. Please make sure WP_Debug is enabled on the server and if you see any errors they can be very useful in troubleshooting this problem as well as locating issues with plugins or the server.
Step 6: Disable 3rd Party Plugins
Note: If you are an advanced user please skip this step for now and do the other ones as they are much quicker and can help troubleshoot the issue faster. If you are new to WordPress, hosting…etc, this is the best place to start.
Sometimes 3rd party plugins that aren’t coded properly could break the Customizer. Disable any 3rd party plugin 1 by 1 to test (no need to disable the recommended plugins, these have been fully tested with the theme). Make sure to clear your cache when disabling plugins 1 by 1 to make sure the Customizer isn’t still loading old code
Step 7: Check Server Error Logs
Checking server error logs is the easiest way to see what may be going on. If the Customizer isn’t saving it will generally save an error in your server error logs. If you have access to them you should look and see if there is any error when you try saving the Customizer. If you aren’t sure how to interpret the data you can always ask your webhost for some assistance.
Step 8: Check Child theme name (too many redirects error)
If you are using a child theme and you are getting an error when trying to load the customizer that says there has been too many redirects this could be an issue related to your child theme name. Make sure your child theme does not have ANY empty spaces and is written in english without any added characters.
Step 9: Contact Support
If you can’t figure out what is wrong please send temp WordPress and FTP access to us via the form on our site with a message telling us what is wrong and we’ll be able to take a look at the problem.