Title: WP Session Manager
Author: Eric Mann
Published: <strong>Desembre 2, 2012</strong>
Last modified: Març 31, 2019

---

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![](https://ps.w.org/wp-session-manager/assets/banner-772x250.png?rev=632899)

This plugin **hasn’t been tested with the latest 3 major releases of WordPress**.
It may no longer be maintained or supported and may have compatibility issues when
used with more recent versions of WordPress.

![](https://s.w.org/plugins/geopattern-icon/wp-session-manager_272e38.svg)

# WP Session Manager

 By [Eric Mann](https://profiles.wordpress.org/ericmann/)

[Download](https://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/wp-session-manager.4.2.0.zip)

 * [Details](https://bal.wordpress.org/plugins/wp-session-manager/#description)
 * [Reviews](https://bal.wordpress.org/plugins/wp-session-manager/#reviews)
 *  [Installation](https://bal.wordpress.org/plugins/wp-session-manager/#installation)
 * [Development](https://bal.wordpress.org/plugins/wp-session-manager/#developers)

 [Support](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/wp-session-manager/)

## Description

Adds `$_SESSION` functionality to WordPress, leveraging the database where needed
to power multi-server installations.

Every visitor, logged in or not, will be issued a session. Session data will be 
stored in the WordPress database by default
 to deal with load balancing issues 
if multiple application servers are being used. In addition, the session collection
will also be stored _in memory_ for rapid use within WordPress.

Session data stored in the database can be encrypted at rest for better security.

## Installation

#### Manual Installation

 1. Upload the entire `/wp-session-manager` folder to the `/wp-content/plugins/` directory.
 2. Activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ menu in WordPress.
 3. Use `$_SESSION` in your code.

## FAQ

  How do I add session variables?

Merely use the superglobal `$_SESSION` array:

    ```
    $_SESSION['user_name'] = 'User Name';                            // A string
    $_SESSION['user_contact'] = array( 'email' => 'user@name.com' ); // An array
    $_SESSION['user_obj'] = new WP_User( 1 );                        // An object
    ```

  How long do session variables live?

This depends on your PHP installation’s configuration. Please read the [PHP manual](http://php.net/manual/en/session.configuration.php)

for more details on configuration.

  Can I use this plugin without creating new tables?

Absolutely! As of version 2.0, this plugin will create a new table for WordPress
to store session data. In general, this is more efficient long-term than using options
for data storage. However, if your system does not allow creating a table, add the
following to `wp-config.php` to use the options table instead:

    ```
    define( 'WP_SESSION_USE_OPTIONS', true );
    ```

  I get an error saying my PHP version is out of date. Why?

PHP 5.6 was designated end-of-life and stopped receiving security patches in December
2018. PHP 7.0 was _also_ marked end-of-life in December 2018. The minimum version
of PHP supported by WP Session Manager is now PHP 7.1.

If your server is running an older version of PHP, the session system _will not 
work!_ To avoid triggering a PHP error, the plugin will instead output this notice
to upgrade and disable itself silently. You won’t see a PHP error, but you also 
won’t get session support.

Reach out to your hosting provider or system administrator to upgrade your server.

  I get an error saying another plugin is setting up a session. What can I do?

WP Session Manager overrides PHP’s default session implementation with its own custom
handler. Unfortunately, we can’t swap in a new handler if a session is already active.
This plugin hooks into the `plugins_loaded` hook to set things up as early as possible,
but if you have code in _another_ plugin (or your theme) that attempts to invoke`
session_start()` before WP Session Manager loads, then the custom handler won’t 
work at all.

Inspect your other plugins and try to find the one that’s interfering. Then, reach
out to the developer to explain the conflict and see if they have a fix.

## Reviews

![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/3fade82313682b30fd29756a60165ad8df8240e6e2fcf0c6ab5b4601f41eea9b?
s=60&d=retro&r=g)

### 󠀁[Works great for caching WP hosting options](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/works-great-for-caching-wp-hosting-options/)󠁿

 [dankfresh](https://profiles.wordpress.org/dankfresh/) Juny 7, 2019

Ran into some issues with Pantheon + WPEngine and sessions being ignored in the 
past. This remedies those issues and abides by their recommendations.

![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/04332d696c89e126824dd83e7677c3ccd2ce7789a9559d5c0cd4929a8ad28b4f?
s=60&d=retro&r=g)

### 󠀁[Crashed entire website](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/crashed-entire-website/)󠁿

 [havasuscannerfeed](https://profiles.wordpress.org/havasuscannerfeed/) Maig 5, 
2019 1 reply

After installing and clicking “Activate” – I left for a few minutes, only to find
this completely corrupted my SQL Database and caused my website to throw a “Error
establishing a database connection” error. Deleting the directory from plugins did
not resolve the issue. My web hosting company is going to attempt to restore a backup
of my site in an attempt to get it back up and running.

![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/092968da21d868077ffac225d195f167f19435d61409f8ec656136c6f3d6f197?
s=60&d=retro&r=g)

### 󠀁[Good job](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/good-job-917/)󠁿

 [Darko G.](https://profiles.wordpress.org/darkog/) Agost 27, 2018

Good code quality, very useful when you need the joy of sessions 🙂 Keep it up.

![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/36e164e819d0519b5593fa348fa545f51b563186363f316486bdde901b53014a?
s=60&d=retro&r=g)

### 󠀁[Very useful and reliable](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/very-useful-and-reliable-3/)󠁿

 [Friese](https://profiles.wordpress.org/friese/) Juliol 26, 2018

I am using WP Session Manager in several projects since some years. Initially, I
was looking for a more reliable session management compared to standard PHP sessions–
and found it in WP Session Manager. Thanks for this great plugin!

![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/a956e7de709cda0fcc40698339e18545bcf6b5dd5d63e83c210988919ded8c97?
s=60&d=retro&r=g)

### 󠀁[Very good and recommended plugin](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/very-good-and-recommended-plugin/)󠁿

 [spassoart](https://profiles.wordpress.org/spassoart/) Gener 18, 2018

A big help on my codes. Don´t miss, will do great.

![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/fc82721b09a4e9f2edc65de3b8f413b5ee01856aaea32144aa555947e4cef919?
s=60&d=retro&r=g)

### 󠀁[good](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/good-2824/)󠁿

 [shokry055](https://profiles.wordpress.org/shokry055/) Setembre 10, 2017

good

 [ Read all 24 reviews ](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/wp-session-manager/reviews/)

## Contributors & Developers

“WP Session Manager” is open source software. The following people have contributed
to this plugin.

Contributors

 *   [ Eric Mann ](https://profiles.wordpress.org/ericmann/)

“WP Session Manager” has been translated into 1 locale. Thank you to [the translators](https://translate.wordpress.org/projects/wp-plugins/wp-session-manager/contributors)
for their contributions.

[Translate “WP Session Manager” into your language.](https://translate.wordpress.org/projects/wp-plugins/wp-session-manager)

### Interested in development?

[Browse the code](https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/wp-session-manager/),
check out the [SVN repository](https://plugins.svn.wordpress.org/wp-session-manager/),
or subscribe to the [development log](https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/log/wp-session-manager/)
by [RSS](https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/log/wp-session-manager/?limit=100&mode=stop_on_copy&format=rss).

## Changelog

#### 4.2.0

 * Update: Change donate link to Patreon vs PayPal.
 * Fix: Disable the initialization routine for cron runs.

#### 4.1.1

 * Fix: Defensively protect deprecated functions with `function_exists()` checks
   to avoid conflicts with other systems.
 * Fix: Disable the initialization routine if sessions are disabled.

#### 4.1.0

 * Fix: Add some defense to ensure end users are running the correct version of 
   PHP before loading the system.
 * Fix: Eliminate a race condition where another plugin or the theme created the
   session first.
 * Fix: Schedule a cron to auto-delete expired sessions.

#### 4.0.0

 * New: Add an object cache based handler to leverage Redis or Memcached if available
   for faster queries.
 * New: Adopt the Contributor Covenant (v1.4) as the project’s official code of 
   conduct.
 * Update: Bump minimum PHP requirements due to out-of-date version deprecations.
 * Fix: Correct a race condition where a session was created before the database
   table existed.
 * Fix: Correct a race condition where the `$wpdb` global is not yet set when a 
   session is deleted from the database.
 * Fix: Remove unnecessary integer session ID from the stored data table.

#### 3.0.4

 * Update: Add support for the `wp_install` hook to create custom table immediately.

#### 3.0.3

 * Fix: Repair code blocks in the readme
 * Fix: Use a more defensive approach to starting sessions in the event another 
   plugin has started one already

#### 3.0.2

 * Fix: Add back in proper array access support for the deprecated `WP_Session` 
   object.

#### 3.0.1

 * Update: Pull a Sessionz fix

#### 3.0.0

 * Update: Refactor to use Sessionz
 * Update: Add encryption at rest if `WP_SESSION_ENC_KEY` is set

#### 2.0.2

 * Fix: Wire the data storage migration to a session init hook to ensure it runs.
 * Fix: Clean up sessions when all data is removed.

#### 2.0.1

 * Fix: Repair data storage that was not returning actual stored session data.

#### 2.0.0

 * Update: Use a table instead of options for storing session data.

#### 1.2.2

 * Update: Use regex pattern matching to ensure session IDs are identical going 
   in/out of the DB to account for encoding differences

#### 1.2.1

 * Update: Additional filters for the `setcookie` parameters
 * Update: Expose the Session ID publicly
 * Fix: Better handling for malformed or broken session names

#### 1.2.0

 * Update: Enhanced plugin organization
 * Update: Added WP_CLI support for session management
 * Update: Add Composer definitions
 * Fix: Break up the deletion of old sessions so queries don’t time out under load

#### 1.1.2

 * Fix a race condition where session expiration options could accidentally be set
   to autoload
 * Make the garbage collection routine run hourly to alleviate long-running tasks
   on larger sites

#### 1.1.1

 * Fix a bug where session expiration was not properly set upon instantiation

#### 1.1

 * Implement Recursive_ArrayAccess to provide multidimensional array support
 * Better expiration for session data
 * Implement garbage collection to keep the database clean

#### 1.0.2

 * Switch to object persistence rather than transients

#### 1.0.1

 * Changes implementation to avoid the use of a global variable (still registered
   for convenience)

#### 1.0

 * First version

## Meta

 *  Version **4.2.0**
 *  Last updated **7 anys ago**
 *  Active installations **2.000+**
 *  WordPress version ** 4.7 or higher **
 *  Tested up to **5.1.22**
 *  PHP version ** 7.1 or higher **
 *  Languages
 * [Danish](https://da.wordpress.org/plugins/wp-session-manager/) i [English (US)](https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-session-manager/).
 *  [Translate into your language](https://translate.wordpress.org/projects/wp-plugins/wp-session-manager)
 * Tag
 * [session](https://bal.wordpress.org/plugins/tags/session/)
 *  [Advanced View](https://bal.wordpress.org/plugins/wp-session-manager/advanced/)

## Ratings

 4.7 out of 5 stars.

 *  [  22 5-star reviews     ](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/wp-session-manager/reviews/?filter=5)
 *  [  0 4-star reviews     ](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/wp-session-manager/reviews/?filter=4)
 *  [  0 3-star reviews     ](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/wp-session-manager/reviews/?filter=3)
 *  [  0 2-star reviews     ](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/wp-session-manager/reviews/?filter=2)
 *  [  2 1-star reviews     ](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/wp-session-manager/reviews/?filter=1)

[Add my review](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/wp-session-manager/reviews/#new-post)

[See all reviews](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/wp-session-manager/reviews/)

## Contributors

 *   [ Eric Mann ](https://profiles.wordpress.org/ericmann/)

## Support

Got something to say? Need help?

 [View support forum](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/wp-session-manager/)

## Donate

Would you like to support the advancement of this plugin?

 [ Donate to this plugin ](https://www.patreon.com/user?u=16402577)