How to Fix Facebook Incorrect Thumbnail Issue in WordPress

Are you experiencing issues with Facebook not displaying the correct thumbnail for your WordPress posts?

This can be frustrating, as it can impact your website’s social media reach and engagement. In this tutorial, we’ll guide you through the steps to fix the Facebook incorrect thumbnail issue in WordPress.

Step 1: Check Your Open Graph Tags

Open Graph (OG) tags are metadata used to describe your website content to social media platforms, including Facebook. They help Facebook understand what your content is about, and what image to display as the thumbnail. Here’s how to check if your website has Open Graph tags:

Open your website in a browser window.
Right-click on the page and select “View page source.”
Look for the following meta tags in the source code:

<meta property="og:title" content="Your Post Title Here" />

<meta property="og:image" content="http://yourdomain.com/path/to/image.jpg" />

If you don’t see these tags, your website might not have Open Graph metadata. You can use a plugin like Yoast SEO to add Open Graph tags to your website.

Step 2: Clear Your Website Cache

If you’ve recently updated your website’s OG tags, but Facebook is still displaying the incorrect thumbnail, your website’s cache might be the issue. To clear your website cache, you can use a plugin like WP Fastest Cache or W3 Total Cache.

Step 3: Use the Facebook Debugger Tool

If your website has the correct OG tags and cache is not the issue, you can use the Facebook Debugger tool to see what Facebook sees when it scrapes your website. Here’s how to use the Facebook Debugger tool:

Go to the Facebook Debugger page: https://developers.facebook.com/tools/debug/.
Enter the URL of the post/page you’re experiencing issues with.
Click on the “Debug” button.

The Facebook Debugger tool will display information about your OG tags, including the image it’s scraping as the thumbnail. If the image is correct, try clicking the “Scrape Again” button. This will refresh Facebook’s cache for your website and should fix the issue.

If the image is incorrect, make sure the OG tags on your website are correct. If they are correct, you can try uploading a new image to your website and updating the OG tags to use the new image.

Conclusion

By following these steps, you should be able to fix the Facebook incorrect thumbnail issue in WordPress. Remember to check your website’s Open Graph tags, clear your website cache, and use the Facebook Debugger tool to troubleshoot the issue.