Magento Tutorials

How to Solve “Magento Service Temporarily Unavailable”

What is Magento Service Temporarily Unavailable?

Magento service temporarily unavailable
Magento Service Temporarily Unavailable

“Service Temporarily Unavailable” is a Magento system message that appears everytime an operation (plugin installation, upgrade) is happening. This is to hide from customers any error occurs during the process. When this message is showing, your website is completely unavailable.

Why is it still there?

Technically, this message should disappear when a certain operation is complete. So why sometimes it is still showing after all tasks are done?

When your Magento website is under some operation, it generates a file that has the only function of showing “Service Temporarily Unavailable” message.

  • Magento 1.x: maintenance.flag file in Magento root folder
  • Magento 2.x: .maintenance.flag file in folder [root Magento folder]/var

Normally this file will be deleted automatically right after the operation is complete. However in some cases, there may be some error during the process that prevents Magento from deleting this file, which is why you still see the message after all the tasks are done.

How do I get rid of it?

Just follow this simple step to remove the Magento Service Temporarily Unavailable message after extension install or after upgrade:

  • Magento 1.x: Manually delete maintenance.flag file in Magento root folder
  • Magento 2.x: Manually delete .maintenance.flag file in folder [Magento root folder]/var

See also:
Magento 403 Forbidden Error
There has been an error processing your request

Dom

A knowledge craver who always strive to be wiser everyday.