Use the Facebook Debugger to Fix WordPress Images

What the debugger is

The Facebook Sharing Debugger is a free tool by Meta. It shows how Facebook sees a web page: its title, description and image, and the Open Graph tags behind them. It can also clear what Facebook has saved about your link.

Why the wrong image shows

1. Missing or wrong Open Graph tags. Facebook uses og:image, og:title and og:description. Without them it guesses.
2. Old cache. Facebook saved an old version of your page.
3. Wrong image size or format. Use at least 1200 x 630 pixels in JPG or PNG.
4. Plugin or CDN trouble. A caching plugin may serve an old page. A CDN may serve an old image. An image optimizer may rename files.
5. No featured image. Facebook then picks any image on the page, or none. A fallback image in your SEO plugin helps.

Use the debugger

1. Copy the URL of your post. Use the public link, not the editor link.
2. Paste it into the Sharing Debugger (developers.facebook.com/tools/debug) and click Debug.
3. Read the result:
   - Link preview shows the image, title and description Facebook will use.
   - Open Graph tags lists og:image, og:title, og:url and others. Check that they are right.
   - Warnings or errors show problems, such as a missing tag.
4. Click Scrape Again. This makes Facebook fetch the page again. Repeat it until the preview is right.
5. Check the image. Share the link again to confirm that the right image appears.

Fix the cause in WordPress

• Set a featured image for every post.
• Use an SEO plugin (Yoast SEO, Rank Math or All in One SEO) to set the social image.
• Clear the cache of your caching plugin and CDN after you change an image.
• Use an image of at least 1200 x 630 pixels.

Quick recap

• Paste the link into the Sharing Debugger and click Scrape Again.
• Set a featured image and Open Graph tags.
• Clear caches in WordPress and your CDN.