Native PHP Sessions
Use native PHP sessions and stay horizontally scalable. Better living through superior technology.
4.9(16 reviews)
·10K+ active installs·Updated 4 months agoAs of April 2026, Native PHP Sessions is a WordPress comments plugin with 10K+ active installations and a 4.9/5 rating from 16 reviews. It has been downloaded 1.3M+ times in total. Requires WordPress 5.3+ and PHP 7.4+. Available on WordPress.org since 2014. Downloads are down 22% this week. Top alternative: Akismet Anti-spam: Spam Protection.
4.9/516 reviews
10K+active installs
1.3M+total downloads
12 yearssince 2014
Overview
WordPress core does not use PHP sessions, but sometimes they are required by your use-case, a plugin or theme.
This plugin implements PHP’s native session handlers, backed by the WordPress database. This allows plugins, themes, and custom code to safely use PHP $_SESSIONs in a distributed environment where PHP’s default tempfile storage just won’t work.
Note that primary development is on GitHub if you would like to contribute:
https://github.com/pantheon-systems/wp-native-php-sessions
Configuration
By default the session lifetime is set to 0, which is until the browser is closed.
To override this use the pantheon_session_expiration filter before the Native PHP Sessions plugin is loaded. For example a small Must-use plugin (a.k.a. mu-plugin) could contain:
<?php
fun…Ratings & Reviews
4.916 reviews
5 ★
14
4 ★
2
3 ★
0
2 ★
0
1 ★
0
Recent Reviews
Wow! This plugin works great!
by Infinite Uploads·4 years ago
I did not have high hopes for this, looking for plugins to resolve the issue my site was having in Site Health and figured I might as well try this after running across it on Google. I installed it, and it fixed loopback requests and API issues in Site Health. I am very impressed!
Holy Smokes!
by uninvolved·4 years ago
I have no idea how this plugin even works. As I was going through the list of popular/recommended plugins, this one was way down on the list.
I installed it on my test site and it didn’t break anything, so I moved it into the production site.
I use a plugin that lets me view the error log without having to open an FTP client. Since installing this plugin, I’ve had almost zero errors in the log. In fact, right now it has been more than 48 hours (pretty high traffic site) and not a single error has been added to the log.
Again, I have no clue how this plugin works. I understand the plugin conceptually, else I’d have never installed it. But, the specifics I do not know. What I do know for certain is that there’s a marked improvement by way of reduced errors. I think the site may even be more responsive – but it already operates with an A/A on the various page load/speed tests, so I can’t measure any difference there.
This is a site with more than 70 active plugins and maybe 200 visitors a day.
Excellent
by OkorieWare·5 years ago
Native PHP Sessions is easily another plugin that should be standard for WordPress. And, support is excellent too.
Danke! Problem gelöst!
by atigoal·5 years ago
Danke.. habe sehr lange nach dem Fehler gesucht und mit diesem Plugin das Problem gelöst.
This tool saves your work!
by lefaye·5 years ago
Native PHP Sessions fixed all errors (curl errors) in my WP installation! Now wordpress shows no errors in the page status but “Top Job” 🙂
Thank you so much!
Download Trends
Today: 359Yesterday: 572This week: 3KPeriod total: 203K
Compatibility
| WordPress | 5.3+ requiredTested up to 6.9.4 |
| PHP | 7.4+ required |
Version Adoption
v1.4
85.2%
Other
7.5%
v1.2
7.3%
Top Alternatives to Native PHP Sessions
Frequently Asked Questions
Changelog
1.4.5 (December 2025)
- Compatibility: Supports WordPress 6.9
Contributors
Plugin data sourced from WordPress.org. Analysis and metrics by PluginSift.